Out Of My Mind
by Garbage and City Lights
Summary: Stormtrooper MN-8486 has finally landed a spot as an expert technician on Starkiller Base. Unfortunately, she's more out of her league than she could've ever expected when Commander Kylo Ren begins exploring the deeper parts of her mind... without asking first. (Starts off slow, gets very steamy!)
1. Chapter 1

It was happening again.

Every time it started the same way: she sat down at her cold grey console, began working with the complicated system, and felt it. A soft, strange sensation inside her head, as though someone were poking around with thick fingers. She would squeeze her eyes shut and shake her head — imperceptibly, so as not to draw General Hux's attention — until the feeling went away.

And it did go away. Eventually. Until a few hours later, when it came back. Poke.

Manna wondered if she'd been working too hard. Being promoted from stormtrooper to a systems technician on Starkiller Base was a big deal, a huge deal, and at the very least meant she didn't have to wear that fucking mask anymore. She looked much better in black anyway.

She'd spent the previous few months doing everything she could to prove her talents to the General — which, naturally, meant proving her talents to about five other people before word of the dexterity of both her hands and mind met his ears — and so maybe this was a side effect. A strange sort of headache. A new form of migraine.

Maybe, Manna thought with a small pang of worry, it had something to do with the planet itself. Where it drew its power from. What it was intended to do.

Nonsense. The First Order knew what it was doing. Overthinking, that was her problem.

She'd always been an overthinker. Growing up in the First Order did that to you, Manna supposed. You either thought too much or you didn't really think at all.

Poke.

She screwed her eyes shut and shook her head, losing the blinking lights before her in sudden darkness.

Poke.

"MN-8486." The General's clipped tone jolted her nearly out of her seat; Manna sat straight up and gave him a quick salute.

"General. I apologize — I —"

"Might I remind you that you were afforded this position based on a series of highly ranked technicians assuring me that you could perform this duty _flawlessly?"_

The fingers suddenly withdrew. Hux stared at her, his eyes as much cold metal as the console she'd been ignoring.

Most of the other technicians didn't even glance her way but Manna could feel the room nearly humming with tension. Shit.

She wanted to explain the poking but that was most definitely a lost cause; she opened her mouth instead to issue another apology only to be interrupted by the clicking of boots on the floor of the cockpit.

 _Shit_. If the room had been humming before, it was all but rumbling now.

"General," crackled a familiar, almost robotic voice. Everyone knew what the sound of those boots meant and who they brought with them.

Manna went furiously back to her task, hands working away at the charging system, hoping like hell Commander Ren hadn't seen her slacking on the job. A mistake like that didn't get you fired — it got you far, far worse.

She could feel Hux's icy stare on her still, but only for a moment before he turned and faced the tall masked man to his left.

"Yes, Ren, I'm currently dealing with a situation —"

"Supreme Leader Snoke wishes to speak with us," Commander Ren intoned, sounding almost bored and interrupting the General as though he hadn't even said anything at all.

Hux pressed his lips together in a thin line, then looked back at Manna, who was no longer shutting her eyes or shaking her head but working madly at the system controls like the good little technician she was supposed to be.

When the Commander spoke again, it was one impatient word:

"Now."

Blessed relief rushed through her when General Hux turned to the cockpit's supervisor and snapped, "See to it MN-8486 does not shirk her duties again. If you notice noncompliance, send her to reconditioning straight away."

 _Harsh_ , Manna found herself thinking in reflex, though she knew it was lucky the Commander had shown up when he did. She might already be on her way to reconditioning, as it were.

"Affirmative, General."

Hux marched out of the cockpit, stiff and bristling. Manna waited for the hooded figure near her console to follow suit but he stood there, a new set of eyes staring at her — at least, she assumed he had eyes behind that hideous mask.

A hot lump had formed in her throat she suddenly found herself unable to swallow.

Commander Ren leaned in, presumably to reprimand her as well, at least oh god she hoped that's what was happening, she had seen the melted consoles he took his frustration out on and heard more than one of his tantrums from the hallway, maybe he had sent Hux away so he could deal with her himself? It was only a moment she had shut her eyes, only a moment and she had just wanted that strange feeling in her brain to go away so she could —

Poke.

When the robotic voice hissed out of the mask, it was quiet enough that Manna was fairly certain she was the only one who could hear it.

"You're absolutely right," the Commander whispered. "You think too much."

Before she could even make sense of what this meant he began to lean away, thought better of it, leaned back in again.

"And too _loudly_."

Then he was gone, black cape whisking behind him, boots clicking away down the hall until all Manna could hear was the sound of her own panicked heartbeat thudding at the back of her skull.


	2. Chapter 2

Too close. Far, far too close.

Manna kept thinking those words again and again as she stared out the window of her quarters, over the expanse of snow-covered trees and endless icy plains that made up 90% of Starkiller Base. They were humming in her head like a constant lullaby: too close.

That's what she had been to losing her coveted spot as a systems technician, the one she'd worked so hard for. That's what she had been to being sent to reconditioning. Manna had hated the original conditioning enough that the idea of going through another, stronger cycle made her skin crawl.

It was also what Commander Ren's mask had been to her face. Far too close.

Close enough to hear the wheeze of his robotic breath and not feel it on her cheek. How exactly did his mask work, anyway? And what was hiding behind it? She combed her fingers through her straw-colored hair absently, working out the workday's inevitable knots with slow precision.

It was nighttime, dark. Manna had stayed late at her position to show her supervisor (and Hux, should he return — which he didn't) that her dedication to her duties was not up for debate. It was nearly 0100 hours when she'd finally reached her quarters but she found herself unable to sleep. Too many thoughts running through her head.

The trees looked pretty beneath their glittering coats of snow. Moonlight glinted off the frost like a thousand fallen stars —

"You seem not to have fully grasped my earlier message, MN-8486," said a synthetic voice from the doorway of her quarters. Manna, for the second time that day, was caught off guard; she whirled from her position at the window, so lost in thought that she hadn't even heard the door open.

She'd managed to spend most of her time on Starkiller avoiding the Commander (as had been strongly advised before her transfer) yet every time she saw him in the flesh something inside her seemed to freeze over. He was just so imposing, like he brought the frost inside with him and it spread across the cold metal with every step.

"Commander Ren!" Manna expected him to cut her off, that's typically how a conversation with General Hux unfolded, but he chose not to speak and she realized she had no more to say.

She became suddenly and painfully grateful that she hadn't yet undressed from her work uniform for bed. Manna reasoned if he had access to her quarters this late at night he had access at any time, and if he'd caught her in her panties —

He put one leather-gloved hand up in a sharp gesture — stop.

"You think," Commander Ren growled through his mask, "too much. And too loudly. I believe I made this clear in the cockpit."

No. He hadn't. Except... that decisive mental poke, the one she'd felt so many times before... had that come from him?

The idea had seemed preposterous before and yet Manna recalled all the rumors of the Commander pulling stormtroopers across rooms with a flick of his wrist. She'd never seen the Force in action, had no reason to believe in it to begin with and yet did she have a reason not to —

"You're. Not. Listening." He took three steps into her room, one for each word. His boots clicked menacingly.

Her quarters were not large; they were less than a few feet from each other now. As Commander Ren stepped away from the door, deactivating the motion sensors, it slid quietly shut behind him.

"I'm sorry," Manna blurted, pressing her back against the window in an unconscious way of furthering the distance from her commanding officer. "What — what do you mean I _think_ too loudly?"

And what the hell was Kylo Ren doing in her quarters past midnight?

"I'm 'dealing with a situation,'" the Commander said, echoing the General's earlier words about Manna's infraction. His synthesized voice sounded tight and controlled despite his clearly growing irritation with her. "That's what I'm doing here. You try sleeping when the thoughts of a silly technician are battering around your brain like a trapped, particularly _stupid_ bird." He paused, and then she could practically hear the smirk in his voice when he added, "I suppose you know that feeling quite well, actually. Thus, why you're awake yourself."

It was a lot to take in all at once. Commander Ren could... read her mind? But it wasn't that simple, her thoughts were actually distracting him, _bothering_ him, keeping him awake in the dead of night. And that last part — that last part had been an insult!

She was almost too shocked to say anything before something occurred to her, and perhaps it was that shock that allowed her to make such a foolish mistake.

"It's your fault," Manna murmured, gripping the cool metal windowsill to ground herself.

She couldn't read the face hidden behind the mask, of course, but the pause that followed was not a good one.

"It's your fault," she repeated, because she felt it necessary to add, "You're the one who's been... poking around up there. In my head. You must've... set something off. Or turned something on. You're the reason I almost got reconditioned yesterday!" Manna said those final words with a surprising lilt of accusation, considering who she was standing off with in the tiny cramped space of her quarters.

"Yes," he finally responded. She wasn't sure to which part.

Poke.

"That's — that's very rude, to do something like that!" Manna instinctively shut her eyes and shook her head, trying to shoo him off like a fly from warm food, appalled she had spoken in such a way to her commanding officer.

"It was too tempting to resist," Commander Ren said, his tone almost infuriatingly matter-of-fact. "So much happening in there." She felt the beginnings of a warm blush creep into her cheeks. She wondered when he would leave her alone.

"Well, now you've done something. Started... an echo chamber. That's not my fault! I can't... not think!"

"I will leave you alone when I get some measure of peace." Another step towards her, another click. "Such a silly thing, awake at all hours thinking about trees and snow and..." Step, click. "...me."

"Your mask," Manna corrected instantly. Why did these things keep popping out of her? She had a smart mouth, sure, there was no denying that but all of it stayed in her head where it belonged; one couldn't be a stormtrooper with an attitude, and she'd learned that fast. So _why?_ Why was she speaking her mind to, of all men in the galaxy, Kylo Ren?

"Because I am allowing it." She couldn't see it but almost felt the narrowing of his eyes. Again, supposing he had them behind those black and silver slits. "If you could, you would lie, but there is no use for it with your thoughts crowding against mine. It would be like... verbal feedback." He chose his words carefully and Manna realized he was actually trying to figure this odd situation out — it wasn't a joke, it wasn't intimidation. He was confused and looking for answers.

 _That makes two of us,_ she thought, and he scoffed a little.

"You may as well speak every thought aloud. I hear them that clearly." He tapped the smooth black forehead with one gloved finger. "And I would like it to stop."

"Maybe you shouldn't have been poking around in a place like that to begin with," Manna sneered. Oh how she wished she could at least conceal the way she felt, cut back the utter disrespect in her tone, but she was helpless; it was all pouring out like water from a crumbling dam and Commander Ren was just standing in the wake of the flood. "I have no privacy in this place as it is, I never _have,_ the only haven I have is my mind and now even that has your... sticky fingerprints all over it!"

An image of herself standing at the window in only her panties, bare breasts prickled with goosebumps from the chill of the endless winter outside, flashed across her mind though she tried to stop it. It was a mental association — privacy, which lead to the fact that she had none, which lead to Kylo Ren standing in her quarters, which lead to 'what if he had shown up when I was in my normal state of dress this time of night', which would've lead to something far worse except Manna clamped down with everything she had and cut the thread there.

A long, sinister silence lingered between them. She swallowed thickly.

She had begun to wonder if Commander Ren wasn't human after all, that some of the rumors were true and he was actually a very advanced droid masquerading as a man; perhaps he had powered down because he had been standing there deathly quiet for such a long time when finally he said,

"Oh?"

Step. Click. He was only a few inches away now.

"It _would've_ happened, you say? Are you so sure? Something... far _worse?"_

Before Manna could say (or even think) anything in response Commander Ren slammed his hands on either side of her head against the window, closing the gap between them, pressing his chest to the swell of hers. She yelped in surprise and closed her eyes, waiting for the blow, but it never came.

Instead, there was a feathery light touch between her legs — a sudden, alarming intrusion, and yet it coaxed a weak moan from her all the same.

This had been why she'd cut that damn thread. But not in time, it seemed.

Ren placed the mouthpiece of his mask directly next to her ear, the robotic crackle of his voice sending a shudder through her already quivering body.

Too close. Far, far too close.

"Perhaps," the Commander murmured, "I simply need to give you something else to think about."


	3. Chapter 3

Impossible.

It had taken her several moments of panic-stricken pleasure to realize that while the caresses were working away softly at the folds between her legs, both of Commander Ren's palms were still pressed against the glass window. Also, she was still wearing her full work uniform — no skin exposed beyond her hands and collarbone — and yet it felt as though the pads of two soft fingers were tracing the lips of her sex. Which was, of course, impossible.

He pulled his mask away from her ear but left his hands where they were. The expressionless chunks of leather and metal stared her down as though daring her to ask.

"How?" Manna managed at last, and as the word left her lips her work-sanctioned boots suddenly slid apart, giving the phantom fingers far more access to her most private area.

She had not done that.

Her breathing was heavy now as she attempted to focus on the Commander's mask, make some sense out of it. Manna was so intent on the monster in her face and the pleasure blooming between her legs that she barely noticed the _other_ fingers were back, picking delicately away in darker portions of her brain.

"There it is," the modulated voice crooned, like he'd found something he was looking for.

"What —" And that was all she was able to get out because suddenly the gentle stroking grew even softer, slower, focused on a particularly tender spot between her lips to the right of her clitoris — a spot only Manna had been aware of, a spot she touched even now in the dead of night when her body was the loneliest and she craved the sweetest, quickest release.

A moan bubbled out of her, one that was a little too loud even for the closed doors of her quarters, and now Ren did remove one hand from the glass to press against her mouth. It was cold from the winter chill and smelled not unpleasantly of worn-in leather. For some odd reason, the pressure of his move to silence her caused Manna's hips to buck uncontrollably into the phantom touch.

Except there was nothing to buck into except for Commander Ren's own hips, which were pressed nearly flush against hers. Nearly flush, but not quite —and so when she made contact, she was both humiliated to have done something so inappropriate to her commanding officer, as well as utterly shocked to find he had an erection beneath his billowing black robes.

Ren didn't move; the mask didn't (couldn't) flinch. He kept his hips in place and the sensations on her special spot began to speed up.

Manna couldn't help it. The combination of incredibly focused pleasure and the way he was holding her there, the strength in the hand over her mouth, she simply had no power over how her hips were snapping towards his as though Ren was actually touching the place between her thighs.

Or as though there were another part of him there.

An image flashed lightning-quick across her mind of Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried inside her to the hilt — it was lightning-quick because it's all Manna would allow, even in her confused and lust-fueled state, but it had an immediate effect on him. A crackle burst out of the mask, almost like a sharp exhalation of breath. He pushed his hips on hers. Hard.

It was no use. The last of her mental reserves were depleting by the second and, she later suspected, he had used the Force to loosen her resolve the same way he'd loosened her tongue only minutes earlier.

Ren let her do all the work.

Manna dared to grip him tightly — one hand on his shoulder, the other on the bicep that strained against his robes as he continued to hold a palm over her mouth — and bucked with abandon against the one of the highest ranking commanding officers the First Order had to offer.

It was the strangest sort of intimacy she'd ever experienced (though she had experienced very little.) Layers of clothing separated them, he was using the Force to stimulate the most sensitive spot on her body, and she was slowly but surely working her way towards an intense orgasm directly on Commander Ren's rock hard cock.

The most puzzling part was the mask, which remained silent after that single crackle and stared at her intently with hollow black holes where eyes should've been.

And then it was over for Manna. As the tender assault on her special spot continued relentlessly, the pad of a soft invisible thumb trailed over her stiff, aching clitoris in devastating circles.

She was grateful for the leather-clad hand over her mouth; Manna let out what would've surely been a piercing cry to wake half the lodging quarters if not for the glove keeping it at bay. Waves of pleasure rocked her body and she snapped her head to the right, an unconscious habit she always did when she came. As she rode out her climax against Commander Ren's swollen crotch he used the palm covering her mouth to jerk her face back towards the mask.

It was too much to look into those endless black pools. Manna closed her eyes only to hear the synthetic voice order, "Open them."

She did as she was told. She stared into the void of Kylo Ren's mask until at last her orgasm subsided, her hips stilled, and gentle aftershocks shook through her like an alcoholic's tremors.

He released her then. Her breath burst out of her in an exhausted rush but she took care to be as quiet as possible — to anger him now seemed more than dangerous, it seemed to be a death wish. As unpredictable as the Commander himself was, this entire situation was even more so.

Ren stepped away from her. His blank mask regarded her with silent judgment.

"There," he finally said, the voice modulator devoid of any emotion whatsoever. "You're much quieter now."

Commander Ren turned on his heel and left Manna's quarters, each step a decisive click. The doors slid open and shut as quietly as they had when he'd first entered.

Manna stayed against the wall for a moment, utterly stunned, completely unsure as to what had just taken place. She found, quite pleasantly, that she had no desire or energy to consider it at that particular time. Instead she peeled off the sweat-soaked First Order uniform, slid into bed, and slipped almost immediately into a gentle, dreamless sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

_The firm muscles of his arms, hard and supple beneath her desperate palms._

Manna got out of bed.

 _The single, shocked crackle of static that shot out of his helmet when she imagined what he might feel like inside her._

Manna got into the shower.

 _The smell of black leather._

Manna got dressed.

 _The delicious shock of realizing he_ was _human, and that her hips were bucking against a very real erection._

Manna ate her breakfast rations.

 _The growl of his modulated voice demanding she open her eyes._

Manna saluted General Hux.

 _The sudden, sweet pressure of his hard cock against her as he slammed their hips together._

Manna did her job.

 _The sudden, sweet pressure of his hard cock against her as he slammed their hips together._

Manna did her job.

 _The sudden, sweet pressure of his hard cock against her as he slammed their hips together._

Manna did her —

"General Hux." The synthetic growl came seemingly out of nowhere. She snapped her head up from the complicated (yet monotonous) task she'd lost herself in and was shocked to see Commander Ren standing beside her supervisor and the General. She hadn't even heard the telltale clicking of his boots, she'd been so deep in her own —

Oh.

 _Shit._

"Commander," the red-haired General responded briskly. He barely turned from the system he was analyzing with another tech and her supervisor, sending a quick glance in Ren's direction.

 _Stop thinking. Stop thinking. Stop thinking._

Manna ducked her head down and continued her duties without skipping a beat, though the same could not be said of her heart. In fact, it was kind of in her throat at the moment.

"MN-8486." He wasn't facing her, he was addressing her superiors, but the sound of her stormtrooper ID coming from that mask sent a shudder through her body. Not a good one. Not like —

 _The sudden, sweet pressure of his hard cock against her as he slammed their hips together._

He was only visible out of the corner of her eye, but she could've sworn she saw the Commander's body jerk... just slightly.

 _I have to stop. Stop thinking. Look. Look at that piece of tech there, the Weapon will never perform as it should unless you set it just so._

"I would have reprimanded her properly yesterday, Commander," said Hux, his lip curling as he addressed Ren in a cold sneer, "but I do believe I was interrupted." The cockpit supervisor looked between the two, wisely keeping silent.

"Yes. Well. The commands of the Supreme Leader are ours to follow." Manna could almost feel the empty eyes of his mask on her. She forced herself not to look.

 _It won't fit like this. You know better than that. Really_ look _at the damn thing. You need to adjust it._

"What do you want with my systems technician, then, _Commander?"_ Hux let out a sharp breath that might have been meant to pass as a put-upon sigh. "She has work to do."

 _Adjust the piece. Yes. Now put it there. Look, it fits. It fits like_ —

 _Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried inside her to the hilt —_

Suddenly there was a gloved hand crushing her wrist, wrenching her out of her seat as the piece of tech fell to the ground and broke.

"I'm sending her to reconditioning myself," the Commander's synthetic voice barked. Everyone in the cockpit looked up from their work, startled. Manna knew better than to struggle against him but she was too afraid to look at his mask. _Reconditioning._ Oh, how she'd fucked up. She'd fucked up _bad._

His leather-bound fingers gripped her tighter, yanking her away from the console to stand next to him like an admonished child with a stern schoolteacher. Her wrist was beginning to ache but what was worse was the thought of going through the whole process all over again, being broken down only to be broken down again and then once more for good measure... she wasn't sure she could take it.

Manna held herself as high as she could, given the circumstances. One thing they taught you in conditioning was to accept your punishments with grace.

"Reconditioning?" Hux echoed, incredulous, as though the idea he'd proposed himself sounded absolutely insane coming from the Commander.

"Reconditioning." Without waiting for a discussion he forced Manna ahead of him, placing his other hand on the back of her neck to control her like an unruly dog, and began to steer her out of the cockpit. "You will need to find a replacement for her position until the process is complete."

Hux called out something containing the word 'ludicrous' and then they were gone, too far down the hallway to hear him protest.

"I tried," Manna whispered, hoping he could hear her through his cowl. In her panic she had forgotten she didn't need to speak for him to hear her. "I tried to stop, I really did, but —"

"Silence."

They wound their way through the cavernous metal halls in silence aside from the clicking of his boots. Her face burned hot with embarrassment. The things she'd been thinking... they weren't just unprofessional, they were _wrong._ She supposed she deserved this.

Manna had nearly come to terms with the punishment fitting the crime when Commander Ren pushed her past the reconditioning quarters.

Her head snapped back as they passed it to watch the formidable cell block fade in the distance behind them. Where were they going?

He was going to kill her.

The realization set in like a heavy stone sinking to the bottom of a black pond: he was going to kill her.

The hand on the back of her neck dug its fingers into her skin; had he not been wearing gloves, he might've drawn blood. The other hand gripping her wrist dropped it to wave at a heavy black door at the end of the hall.

It wasn't a normal door, not like the rest of them on the base. It appeared to have much heavier security, much more advanced tech, and yet it slid open as easily as the door to her measly little quarters with a flick of Ren's wrist.

The Commander forced her inside. As the door shut with a heavy clang behind them — almost as though he had bypassed its typical opening mechanisms in favor of using the Force and then just let it go — Manna had a brief moment to take in the room. Black matte metal walls in strange plated patterns, consoles with blinking red lights, the largest bed she'd ever seen. And then:

"It's not supposed to work this way," Ren's modulated voice hissed in her ear. The grip on the back of her neck was tight, painful, and not getting any looser. It didn't allow her to turn her head and look at him. Not that she particularly wanted to. "Our _situation_ last night was simply meant to shut up that relentlessly racing mind. Not make it worse."

"I'm sorry," Manna gasped. He gave her a little shake, rattling her teeth in her skull.

"You're 'sorry.' How quaint. Do you realize I've spent all morning with that little show of yours playing in my head?" When she didn't answer, the Commander shook her again, harder this time. "It's one thing to hear your insipid thoughts about snow-covered trees. How am I supposed to focus on any task at all when you're..."

He drifted off, seemingly at a rare loss for words, then simply pulled her back against him. Her back pressed against his solid, muscular chest... and her backside into his raging erection.

He placed one hand around her throat from behind and squeezed.

"You're doing this," Ren growled, "on _purpose."_

"I'm not!" Manna squirmed against his grip, her hands instinctively coming up to try to free herself. The squirming was a poor choice; his other arm hooked around her waist and pulled her tight towards him. His cock pushed insistently against her struggling body.

Something emanated from the mask that may have been a moan.

"Yes. You are."

There was a pause as Manna figured out what she was doing; she swallowed hard and stopped fighting against his grip, letting her body go slack. She kept her hands at her throat but stopped trying to force his hand off.

She waited for his next move. His next move was key in determining hers.

Less than an hour ago she'd been eating her breakfast rations.

She didn't have to wait long for the leather glove to release her hip, take hold of her left hand and slowly bring it behind her, placing it on his swollen crotch. Manna swallowed nervously.

"This was your favorite part," Ren's synthetic voice murmured in her ear. "You kept showing me. Again. And again. Is that how badly you want it?"

When she didn't do anything, when she was too _shocked_ to do anything, she felt the fingers of her hand suddenly begin to massage the bulge beneath his robes against their own volition. He was using the Force again. Showing her what _he_ wanted.

There was no reaction until Manna bit her lip and took over the motions herself, mimicking how he had been manipulating her — and then there was a sharp, staticky intake of breath through his mask, a buck of his hips into her touch. It was the most she'd ever seen the Commander react to anything and she found herself utterly fascinated. Utterly... aroused.

Manna _did_ want him. She wasn't so arrogant as to deny that, knowing he could hear and see inside her head as easy as breathing. He was powerful and he was intimidating and he had the strange ability to set her body on fire with lust and she wanted him but...

"There's something else I want first," she murmured. Manna kept her hand moving over his cock in slow, sure squeezes. The mask made no more noise but his hips were following her touch faithfully.

She closed her eyes and instead of telling him, she just thought it.

For a moment she wasn't sure if he was considering the request or simply hadn't heard her. Then the leather gloves left her throat, her hand. Behind her, something clicked, hissed out air. A heavy thump on the floor near her feet.

Kylo Ren's mask stared up at her, expressionless as always.

At her ear, a strangely familiar voice devoid of its static and modulation:

"And now what is it you want?"


	5. Chapter 5

She was not sure what she had expected to see beneath the mask. Truth be told, she had mostly expected to be ejected from his quarters for even asking. To go back to work and control her thoughts and regain some semblance of sanity in her life.

Of all the things Manna might have expected, it was not this.

Smooth, pale complexion peppered delicately by the occasional mole. Strong nose. Full, soft lips. What surprised her most of all, though, were the thick, silky waves of black hair. She needed to run her hands through it, feel it against her skin.

And, as it turned out, he _did_ have eyes. Two of them. They were dark. They were staring at her.

"You expected a monster," Ren said very matter-of-factly. His voice was that of a normal man's now, still oddly familiar yet alien without the synthetic modulation, but both it and his face were devoid of emotion. Before she could respond he answered for her, presumably picking up on her thoughts. "They always expect a monster. They are always... disappointed."

The Commander leaned down, retrieving his helmet from the floor. He walked past Manna to set it with a thunk in a strange, ashy container, brushing by her so casually she half-expected to be dismissed, that he'd become bored by their game of cat and mouse. Instead he turned, facing her — she was still caught off guard by the fact that he did, indeed, have a face — and began closing the gap between them with each slow, measured step, the click of his heels echoing off the walls of his chambers.

Maybe this was a test. Something administered by the First Order. A trial by fire you were supposed to pass and maybe Manna was supposed to — was supposed to — fuck, she had no _idea_ what the correct answer to this test was.

His dark eyes flicked over her and Manna suddenly decided that perhaps asking him to take the mask off had been a bad idea. Now she was hyper-aware of his gaze; the fact she could actually see him assessing her, could tell exactly what part of her body he was looking at (breasts, hips, mouth,) made her feel like a prey animal about to be taken down by its predator.

"Not far off the mark, MN-8486," Ren said, and for the very first time she saw his full lips twitch into something of a smirk. It made her insides feel loose, watery; he seized this moment of weakness and with one swift movement backed her against one of the strangely plated metal walls.

The move was so similar to his original approach in her quarters that a heat bloomed between her legs almost instantly. Except this time instead of a mask of metal and leather leaning against her cheek it was warm skin. This time she could feel his breath in small puffs against her own.

Again, he took her hand and placed it on the bulge at his crotch. He let his hand drop and pulled back so he could see her face.

"I asked you," Commander Ren said quietly, "what is it you want?"

Manna sucked in a deep breath, steadied herself, and began mimicking what he had showed her with the Force. Kneading his hard cock with the palm of her hand then gripping it with all her fingers, alternating the movements, trying to be steady and at the same time unpredictable. Before she got what she really wanted — if she was accepting this insane scenario was really playing out — she wanted to see his face when she touched him.

He must have heard this and decided he was no longer in such a giving mood. Ren kept his expression flat, lips set in a straight line, but his hips betrayed him. He was bucking against her hand, only slightly at first, yet this spurred Manna on. She _was_ going to see something vulnerable from the Commander. She was going to prove to herself once and for all that he _was_ human.

Manna licked her lips and wondered if he came the first time.

Ren's own lips parted just a bit. The thrusts of his hips grew a little more forceful.

So this _was_ happening. It wasn't some sort of demented First Order test. She was in Kylo Ren's quarters and he wanted her and yes, she wanted him. Her console in the cockpit seemed a million miles away.

"Did you?" she whispered, locking eyes with the Commander.

His face broke into a snarl and he seized her by the back of the neck like a misbehaving puppy, a handful of blonde hair and fair skin. Manna let out a surprised cry as he forced her towards the bed and then released her with a rough shove; she stumbled onto it, nearly on all fours, then whipped around to face him. Having her back to Ren was not currently an option.

He stood at the edge of the bed, gloved hands clenched, his mouth tense. He did not look pleased with her, not at all.

"What do you think this is?" Ren demanded. "A game of chess? I make a move, you make a move?" He began tugging his gloves off angrily, slamming them down on the floor. Unlatched his cape and let it fall. Manna was already backing away on the bed as he crawled towards her — he frightened her, she was changing her mind, but he held up one hand (bare at last) and she found herself stuck in place. Another flick of his wrists and her arms were above her head, locked.

She was helpless to do anything but stare as he approached, slinking his way over her body like the predator she knew he was, carefully placing his knees on either side of her hips.

"You couldn't be more wrong."

He began to physically remove the thick black belt at her waist; Manna marveled at how long his fingers were, how quick and dextrous. She was swinging back and forth like the pendulum of a clock — terrified, aroused, terrified, aroused. Her chest vibrated with the panicked thrumming of her heart.

Ren pulled the belt off with a snap of leather and threw it aside. He must've caught wind of her terror through the alarmed race of her thoughts, because without even looking at her face he stretched his full lips into a satisfied smirk.

"That's more like it," he murmured as he began working at the high collar of her uniform. The Commander slid the zipper all the way down the center of the black work-sanctioned top and spread it apart, exposing her plain grey bra and flat stomach. Manna shivered as he slid the palm of his hand along her abdomen, towards her left breast.

She'd been so intent on watching his long-fingered hand that when it stopped just shy of her breast she glanced at Ren to see him staring at her, his eyes like glinting black coins.

"You _should_ be afraid," the Commander assured her with an almost imperceptible nod. "This is not a game. I am not a man to gaze at and romanticize. This is about me taking what I want and thanks to your careless thoughts, for the moment, I want satisfaction. You just happen to be in proximity."

Manna considered this as he left her stomach to inch down the bed towards her feet. He tugged off her work boots and discarded them absently.

"Nothing to say? No flurry of simple-minded questions?" Off with her pants and away they went. It was cold in Ren's quarters; she found herself shivering, and only partially from the chill.

"Damned if I do," Manna managed, and then laughed breathlessly.

Commander Ren turned back towards her, knees on either side of her hips again, his handsome face stern and tense. He lifted a hand and let it hover, palm spread, over her chest; her arms unlocked, but she found herself unable to move them. Without ceremony he slid her top off around her useless limbs and, to Manna's mild surprise, expertly undid the back of her bra. He removed that too and tossed them both aside.

His palm flicked ever so slightly and her arms were back above her head again.

Terrified. Aroused. Terrified. Aroused.

She lay there before him, spread out like a prize catch, utterly vulnerable and suddenly realizing just how far out of her league she really was.

For the first time, Ren smiled, his lips curling in a satisfied grin.

"Now you're beginning to understand," he murmured. The Commander leaned forward on all fours, a hand on either side of her head, his face an inch from hers. He smelled delicious, a rich musk of man-scent and old leather. His dark eyes bored holes into her brain.

"I can take whatever I want."

Aroused. Terrified. Aroused.

Manna's breasts rose and fell with every nervous breath, occasionally brushing her perked nipples against the broad expanse of his chest. He was still wearing the majority of his robes and she was all but naked under him.

Ren tilted his head ever so slightly, still smiling at her.

"But perhaps what I want has changed," he mused. His eyes trailed from her face down her neck to her breasts, then back to her face. "Perhaps it would amuse me more to send you back to Hux in this... compromised state." The Commander paused, licked his lips, then lowered them to her neck and began suckling gently. The sudden wet heat on her sensitive skin drew a surprised moan out of her.

"Perhaps," Ren murmured against her throat, sending delicious vibrations through Manna's body, "I should bring you to the very brink of ecstasy and then throw you out. Use the Force to prevent you from reaching climax on your own." He nipped lightly at the place where her shoulder met her neck, drew his tongue along her collarbone in long sweeping licks. As she squirmed beneath him, she could feel the faint phantom stirrings of those fingers beginning between her thighs.

Manna whimpered helplessly. She couldn't move her arms, his strong body had her pinned to the bed — Commander Ren was right, he could take whatever he wanted from her. She had no leverage against this powerful man.

Except —

Manna closed her eyes.

 _Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried inside her to the hilt._

His mouth on her throat stilled.

 _Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried inside her to the hilt._

"Stop that," he growled.

 _Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried inside her to the hilt, his hips pumping away as she wrapped her arms around his neck and mewled in pleasure._

Without the mask to hide it she could hear his breath growing heavy in her ear. It was fairly telling how he kept his head bent towards her throat so she couldn't see his face, couldn't see the effect it was having on him. But it _was_ having an effect.

 _Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried inside her to the hilt, his hips pumping away as she wrapped her arms around his neck and mewled in pleasure. She leaned her face_ _next to his ear and_ —

"Stop," Ren said again, but this time his voice was low, husky.

 _— and sucked the soft lobe between her lips, suckling gently, scraping it ever so lightly with her teeth_ —

"This... won't work." Yet his hips had dipped towards hers, his erection brushing the cotton panel of her panties, dangerously close.

 _— pausing only to moan against his skin. One hand snuck from the back of his neck and crept into his thick black hair. She raked her nails delicately over his scalp_ —

Manna felt a long-fingered hand slide into her own blonde hair, grasping a fistful in a sort of desperation. He didn't pull or tug, just... gripped it. As though he were trying to ground himself. Ren's breath was coming heavy now.

— _and began moving in time with the Commander's thrusts, meeting them in sweet_ _synchronicity, her core hot and pulsing and_ —

She was focusing so hard on this fantasy, trying to project it in film quality to Commander Ren's brain, that she barely registered when he whirled from her throat with a growl to all but tear her panties off. He tugged them down her legs then from somewhere within those billowing robes began to release his erection.

Manna spread her legs wide as he moved between them, no use of the Force required. Her arms were still locked above her head but she didn't care. Her own breath was quick and shallow; it was happening. _She had made it happen._

Ren, for once, didn't argue with her thoughts. Instead he plunged his hard cock deep into her already slick sex, letting loose a strangled grunt as the moment they'd been imagining together over and over finally came to life.

And oh, it was good. She was almost breathless to feel him inside her, thick and firm, filling her completely but not painfully. The Commander began moving his hips in slow, steady thrusts, withdrawing almost all the way and then burying himself to the hilt. Manna moaned, her head lolling back on the pillow. She had never been fucked like this before — every other encounter had been brief, fumbling, and then she shoved that thought from her head before it could reach his and ruin the moment.

Pleasure rolled through her body in delicious waves with every snap of his hips. She looked up for Commander Ren's face, hoping to see that _something_ there, and was disappointed to find it hidden behind a thick curtain of black hair. _Always hiding his face,_ Manna thought vaguely.

She wanted to rake her hands through his hair, pull his face to hers, these things were pure insanity, just an hour ago she'd been working at her systems console and here she was beneath the Commander of the First Order and yet she wanted more still...

Just like that the invisible grip on her wrists was gone. Manna wasted no time and leaned forward, pressing her naked breasts to the front of his robes, dragging her fingers through his thick silky hair and wrapping it around them. His mouth hungrily sought hers. She parted his full lips and their tongues tangled together, somewhat clumsily, both grappling for the upper hand and neither quite getting it.

Ren moaned into her mouth, the sound nearly sending her over the edge in its utter desperation. Manna gave his tresses a gentle tug and he moaned again, his hips pumping faster, one arm snaking around her waist to pull her even closer and she realized then that he was going to come, she was fucking Commander Kylo Ren and he was just about to come —

Her head snapped to the right as the orgasm hit her like a freight train. Her body was pulsating with every wave of pleasure emanating from head to toe; Manna hadn't even stopped to consider she may need to be quiet, as in her own quarters, but later considered that if any room on the base would be sound-proofed it would be Ren's. A cry ripped its way out of her throat and she tightened her grip in his hair, perhaps pulling a little too hard in the throes of passion — yet it seemed to do the trick.

"Oh—" The Commander let out a sudden, husky groan and she could feel his orgasm pulsing deep in her core, sweet and sinful.

It occurred to her, then, she could see his face.

Manna turned her head back to see him. His eyes were squeezed closed, dark brows twisted in delicious agony, mouth hanging slightly open as he rode out the rest of his climax even as hers was still descending from its heights.

She dared to release her tight grip on his hair and instead run her fingers through it slowly, tenderly, helping him come down.

Suddenly he let the arm around her waist fall away; Manna felt herself drop back to the bed without ceremony. Commander Ren got to his feet with a spryness that belied the vulnerability and ecstasy he hadn't known she'd just seen on his face.

He was already mostly dressed, reaching for his cape on the ground and she was laying there on the bed, completely naked, his seed dripping down her inner thigh. Not even a word or a final kiss. Just laying there. Like a whore.

"I believe whores receive payment," Ren intoned, sounding bored.

Her body was still thrumming with euphoria and yet Manna didn't know which emotion to cling to first — hurt, rage, hurt, rage. The pendulum of a clock.

She felt the sudden urge to cover herself with her hands and she did.

"Where are my clothes?" Manna asked stiffly. She should've known this wasn't going to end well. After all, she was just a silly technician. She just wanted to wipe the semen from her legs, get dressed, and go back to work like none of this had ever happened. She didn't want to think about Kylo Ren anymore. She didn't want to _think_ anymore.

He seized the mask from its ashy display and dusted it off with a quiet reverence, then lowered it onto his head. Manna watched with a strange disjointed sort of loss as his face disappeared inside.

"You won't be needing them," Commander Ren said in that synthetic voice she'd already grown to hate compared to his natural one. "As I told Hux, you'll be replaced until the process is complete."

What?

"Wait," she begged, scrambling off the bed, naked and humiliated but still trying to reach him before he got to the door. That heavy black door with all that advanced tech and security.

Manna tripped over one of her own work-sanctioned boots, stumbled, regained her footing and ran after him. He was nearly there.

"Wait, Ren, please, don't leave me here —"

"You shall address me as Commander, MN-8486," he said, and stepped through the doorway just before it slammed shut.


	6. Chapter 6

She spent the first three hours alone in Ren's quarters screaming.

Well, not _actually_ screaming. Manna knew that was useless — the strange plates on the wall coupled with the added security on the door most likely meant the entire place was soundproof. Why waste her vocal cords with shrieks no one would ever hear when she could go straight to the Commander's mind instead?

Unfortunately, it seemed that their carnal knowledge of each other had the exact effects he'd intended. (He hadn't shared these effects with Manna, of course, but based on his reaction it seemed the sex had been a means to an unknown end.) She could almost feel the screams she projected bouncing off some sort of rubbery shield around Commander Ren's brain. Manna would try over and over again to penetrate the bubble but eventually even her thoughts grew tired and she collapsed back on the bed, rubbing at her temples the same way she'd be rubbing at her throat if the screaming had been real.

Then Manna changed tactics. Hours had passed, she was sure if the screaming was going to work it would've by then, but perhaps the mental shield had weakened. She closed her eyes.

 _Commander Ren pressing her naked body up against the window, buried_ —

The thought was cut off with such a startling abruptness that it was like all the energy went out of her brain. Only for a split second — flickering lights during a power outage — and then she was dizzy, disoriented, she had to lay down again.

That was a new one. Now Ren couldn't only poke around in her mind, he could fight back.

Manna put the back of her hand over her eyes and sighed. She wasn't sure when or how but at some point before his departure the Commander had hidden her clothes, a cruel little boy's prank if there ever was one, so all she could do was wait in naked embarrassment and come up with a plan.

She considered trying again, maybe a new scenario, something spicier and sexier to draw him from wherever he was at the moment, bring him back to his quarters so she could escape —

A familiar caress began between her thighs.

Before Manna could even react her legs were spread wide against her will. She began to sit up, close her legs at the knee, but went sailing back to the mattress, her knees locked open, the back of her hand covering her eyes again.

Shit.

Phantom fingers probed at the folds of her exposed sex, stroking tenderly, teasing around the edge of the spot that both she and Ren knew drove her wild. Teasing, not quite touching, a devilish promise of things to come.

Manna tried again, hard, to shut her legs but the invisible grip held tight.

"Leave me alone," she said breathlessly, struggling to move her hand from her eyes. She was blind and helpless and couldn't even strike back in the one way she had figured out how. To be honest, that abrupt shutdown of her brain had frightened her, and now she was unsure of how far to probe into the Commander's mind again — if at all.

She was considering this when an entirely new sensation began to blossom between her legs.

Rather than fingers, now there was a wet heat there, a slick sliding sort of pleasure that traveled from one side of her womanhood to the other, skipping cruelly over her clitoris. Against her will Manna let out a moan, bucking her hips on the air.

A mouth. An invisible mouth pressed against her most private of parts. That's what he was using the Force for now — to tease her from afar as she stayed trapped in her prison. He really was a cruel little boy, now that she thought about it.

Ren must have picked up on her thoughts, wherever he was, because there was a sudden beautiful sucking pressure around the stiff nub at the crest of her sex, as though he had drawn it into his perfect mouth and was swirling his tongue around it...

Manna moaned again and arched her back, not caring that she couldn't see, barely remembering that she was being kept as a prisoner in Commander Ren's quarters until he decided what to do with her. It felt so good, she was so close already, all she wanted was to come and fall asleep and forget her problems and —

It stopped.

She let out a little cry of frustration and bucked her hips, trying to move the hand from the back of her eyes, but her legs were locked and her hand was stuck and her womanhood was pulsing hot and angry between her thighs.

Manna knew it was useless but she used her free hand to reach for herself, hoping to beat him to the punch and finish, but she _knew_ it was useless and it was and with an almost careless flick that her other hand went flying away, stuck to the bed like a magnet had drawn it there.

Eventually it started up again, the sinfully wet heat, a tongue gliding around her most sensitive parts. Again, almost there, so close, just a few more licks and then it would stop, she would cry out in anger and try to touch herself but it never worked. Her hand would go sailing away every time. Ren was having fun with her, toying with her, it was driving her mad and she knew he was somewhere laughing.

All day, the Commander obeyed his vague threat from their earlier tryst: he kept her on the brink of ecstasy and didn't let her come, let her get so close before backing off entirely and leaving Manna a frustrated, sweaty mess.

She wanted to hate him. She wanted to scream at him, tell him he was horrible, that though she was only a former stormtrooper she was worth more than this. She wasn't a toy for a bored cat to bat around. She wanted to call him a monster but more than anything she wanted him to fuck her because every time she tried to ignore the pleasure he was inflicting on her from a distance he just increased the intensity until it was all she could think about.

It went on like that for hours.

Finally Manna, no longer concerned about the potential danger Ren posed by shutting down her brain, tried to broadcast a coherent thought to him. She sent a single image: herself on her back, legs spread, arms beckoning. Begging. Because she was at that point, begging. There was no room for shame until he stopped teasing her.

He didn't come right away. He made her wait. But he did come.

She wasn't sure how long she'd laid on the bed, sweating and trembling and twitching as he worked away tirelessly between her thighs with the Force, but at some point she heard the big black door slide open. Manna fought against the hand over her eyes but it was still locked there, stiff and useless. The clicks of the Commander's boots echoed in the chilly room.

There was a snap, hiss, thump as he ostensibly removed his mask and placed it in its strange ashy pedestal. More clicks of boots on the floor. Then, finally:

"Are you ready to behave?" Ren murmured thoughtfully.

"Yes." She responded so quickly that she was embarrassed; a deep blush spread from her neck up through her cheeks.

A long pause passed between them. Manna thought she heard the Commander removing his gloves, dropping them on the floor.

"You've been attempting to breach the security of my thoughts all morning. It wasn't difficult to keep you out, not this time. But you kept trying." Click. Click. He was circling the bed, as far as she could tell. "Clever little girl. But one thing you should know: I am always one step ahead." Fingertips brushed her breasts — real fingertips, not the phantom ones she'd been enduring. A pause, then a wet heat enclosed one of her perked nipples as he brought it into his mouth, sucking passionately against her skin.

"Please," Manna begged, and she was embarrassed for begging, she was humiliated that she had to beg even without being specific about what she wanted. She knew he knew. He was just playing with her. Cruel little boy.

"You're not being sent to reconditioning," he said when he pulled away from her breast at last. "You'll stay here until I tire of you. After that, well... I suppose it would serve you best to remain somewhat interesting."

She was so horny, she needed him so badly but Manna finally decided to try one more time. After all, she had always been the kind of girl who thought too much.

Manna projected an image in slow-motion, something she thought would excite him, entice him into finally satisfying her. In it, he was sitting on the bed, fully nude as she rode him. Ren's hands were on her waist, he was guiding her but she was doing most of the work, snapping her hips and wrapping her fingers in his long hair. She was leaning towards him, never breaking her rhythm, and then snaking her tongue slowly along his full lips —

"Fuck."

The soft expletive surprised her, coming from the Commander's mouth. She had hit on something good.

Manna kept up the fantasy and suddenly the hand over her eyes came loose. She used it to grasp his arm as the light came flooding back to her vision; first she couldn't see him, then all she could see was him. He was still so beautiful. It wasn't fair.

"Fuck me," she managed.

His dark eyes were boring into her. Ren was trying to stay focused, she could tell, but he was responding physically to the part she kept showing him — the part where she ran her tongue over his lips. Something about that was changing his mind. She didn't have his ability to _read_ minds, of course, but every time she projected that specific action his whole body became tense. She could feel it beneath her palm, a subtle hardening of his muscles.

He wanted her. She just had to push him over the edge.

Manna licked her lips, locked eyes with him, and sent it through again: her lithe body riding his, one hand in his hair, her tongue tracing a path over his lips.

Ren let loose a frustrated groan and began to disrobe. Not fully, no, she wasn't so lucky as to get her complete fantasy but he was pulling off his cape, getting to the point where he could release his cock and begin to stroke it.

At first, that's all he did: stroke his cock and watch her, his face devoid of emotion. Then he said,

"Do you want me to fuck you?"

The words sent a delicious shiver through her body. Manna realized she was no longer being held down by the Force and sat up, chewing her lower lip, watching him.

"Yes."

Ren began to crawl towards her.

He then surprised her by crawling past her, leaning himself against the headboard of his bed, spreading his legs as a lewd invitation.

"I want you to fuck _me."_ He was still stroking himself, almost absently. He said it as though it had been his own idea, something that was not under her control. "Like you showed me. Do what you were showing me."

Manna wasted no time. In a previous life, in the hundreds of years ago that her former self seemed to be, she would have resisted. There was no resisting now.

She crept towards him, straddled his waist, dared to sneak her fingers into his hair. She hovered over him, placing her wet womanhood at the tip of his throbbing dick. She licked her lips.

Ren was staring at her.

Here it was, the moment she had been waiting for. She was ready to fuck him and he was hard, ready, and yet Manna still considered all of her options before passing the point of no return.

In one devastating thrust, she plunged herself down onto his hard cock, the both of them letting out a groan of blessed relief. A brief moment of clarity allowed her to realize that she was a mere technician on Starkiller Base, she was a drone, a nothing, someone who could be disposed of at any moment and yet she held this power in her hips so she began to move them in a slow steady rhythm that seemed not only instinctual but necessary.

Ren moaned low in his throat, trying to give her the least amount of response. His hands lay at his sides, not touching her, but twitching unwittingly.

Manna knew what she had to do. This was her opportunity, she could overpower him through her sex and she could escape. She just had to keep her wits about her.

One slow thrust of her hips. Ren bucked against her as she did so, his eyes dark and burning.

Another thrust. He snaked an arm around her waist, holding her in place. His eyes scanned her face.

She kept it up that way, slow and careful, locking his gaze with hers as she rode him just like she had pictured in her mind. He kept the arm around her waist tight but otherwise didn't touch her, despite the way his free hand twitched into a fist with every buck of her hips. The fingers in his hair alternated between careful stroking and gentle but firm tugging.

Now for the coup d'état. Manna took the Commander's chin in her hands and, with his cock buried deep in her warm center, drew her tongue along his full, pink lips. She rolled her hips — not much, just a little — and kept licking, kept the grip in his hair strong, pulled it just a little too hard.

Ren moaned into her open mouth. She felt the pulsing of his seed as he emptied himself into her. The arm around her waist didn't fall away; he kept her close.

The moan was what did it. His open display of pleasure into her own mouth pushed her over the edge, not to mention the hard insistence between her legs, the protective arm around her waist. She came hard, in silence, not wanting him to know how much his own pleasure had affected her. She turned her head to the right, eyes closed as though she couldn't bear to look at him.

Manna waited as he breathed heavily through his orgasm. When he seemed almost done, she looked back at him and bucked her hips again — once, experimentally.

He growled, low and long in his throat. Perhaps this was a weakness? Maybe, post-orgasm, he was more easily pliable. She bucked her hips again.

And then...

He seized her roughly by the back of the neck, like a dog you may not trust.

"Silly thing," the Commander said, and withdrew his cock from her with a surprising deftness. Before Manna even knew what he was doing, he was in charge, thrusting three thick fingers deep inside her slick sex without mercy. Not invisible fingers. Real ones.

"You think you're in control here?" His fingers were deft, unforgiving. Manna writhed against him, wishing she could pull away, but he had her held fast in place. There was still the arm around her waist to consider.

It wasn't enough for him to make her come, oh no. He had to rule her. That much was clear. The look on his handsome, terrible face showed that fact as plain as day.

Manna tried to pace herself; she bucked but there was no give. Instead, all she was allowed to do was follow the intrusion.

She snapped her hips forward uncontrollably. The three fingers thrust inside her, stimulating her to the core.

"Please," she gasped, because it was all she knew. All she could hope for.

Ren grunted softly and pumped his hand into her, bringing forth a fresh burst of pleasure. He looked determined, stern, but his eyes burned.

"What do you want from me?" he asked quietly. "I'm a monster. What do you expect from a monster?"

Manna opened her mouth to respond and the answer was lost in a passionate groan as he carefully stroked the most sensitive part of her inner womanhood. It was a delicate, devastating move: Manna felt it right away, and it was almost as though he had tried to distract her from something. Instead, she felt it entirely, and spasmed and groaned and came around his thick fingers deep inside her.

She came so hard that she could feel it in the Commander's head as well as her own — the utter release of control, the pleasure that rolled over her afterwards. They could both feel it, and it was intoxicating.

When she was done, Ren released the arm around her waist. Manna had no strength left; she collapsed back to the bed, naked and breathless beside him, her hours of unfulfilled desire finally quenched. She waited for him to leave but he didn't. He leaned against the headboard and closed his eyes, breathing heavily through his nose.

She chewed her lip. She watched him, beautiful in his recovery, the eye of a world-ending storm.

And then she dared to be brave. As the Commander of the First Order laid next to her, sweaty, spent, Manna crawled to his side. She paused, considered turning back, pressed a shy kiss to his shoulder. She didn't have any idea what he was thinking but she didn't care — maybe, for once, she could catch a lucky break.


	7. Chapter 7

"Why Manna?"

The low rumble of his voice woke her from a light sleep she hadn't even known she'd slipped into. She sat up quickly, a bit disoriented before it all came back to her: she was in Commander Ren's quarters, she was naked, and she was not exactly allowed to leave.

He was still sitting there, leaning against the headboard with a casual sort of grace. His dark hair was tousled from their lovemaking, from her hands being tangled in it. Unbelievably, she felt a fresh warmth of desire bloom between her legs.

"I — I'm sorry, what?" She sounded stupid to her own ears but his question made no sense. Why her? Though, in retrospect, it was a question worth asking herself: why had he chosen her?

As it were, that was not the question he was asking.

"Why do you call yourself Manna?" Ren murmured. He was watching her with a strange sort of intensity she was beginning to become familiar with. Poking around in her head, it seemed, even as she slept. There was no escaping him.

She considered not answering, letting him do the work himself if he insisted digging around in there, but he tilted his head just slightly and she found herself saying, "I saw it in a book once. I can't remember which one. It sounded pretty and I didn't like being called MN. It felt... right. For me."

Manna felt her cheeks warm as she explained the choice of her secret name. It was unfair that he had used the Force, made her tell him. No one knew what she called herself and no one knew why she did until now. Commander Ren knew. But, she supposed, he could know anything about her if he wanted. Which made it all the stranger that he had asked.

His full lips twitched into a pitying smirk.

"'It sounded pretty.' I should've figured as much."

The words stung. He wasn't wrong to look down on her, not really, but Manna suddenly wished she had her clothes. She felt far too exposed.

Covering her breasts shyly with an arm, she chewed her lower lip and glanced back to the rumpled black sheets beneath her.

"Please let me go back to work," Manna asked in a soft, careful voice that embarrassed her. Despite her failings she knew she was strong, moreso than the others, yet she was reduced to begging in the face of the Commander. She was begging because he'd already proven to her what he could do and she wasn't sure she could endure much more.

By the time this thought fully crystallized, she realized she'd given him more ammunition than he needed.

"'It sounded pretty,'" Ren said again, and the words were sour in his mouth, a stupid mistake worth spitting out. "That's a weak way to view things, MN-8486." Suddenly, unexpectedly, he was pulling the rest of his robes over his head.

What was this, a new way of breaking her down? Surely nothing more then a fresh form of punishment. Manna bit her lower lip and waited for the blow to land.

One layer of black, then another. It seemed like forever and then they were all gone and there he was, _finally._

Seeing him naked for the first time reminded Manna of other firsts: the realization he was human, the sight of his face, the warmth of his breath. His body was just as lithe and supple as she'd expected it to be after having it pressed against her own enough times, but she hadn't expected his skin to be so smooth, so porcelain-pale and perfect.

She realized too late that he could hear all this as if she were narrating her own life story to him. Worst of all, her story wasn't even an interesting one — he looked bored. The Commander folded his arms behind his head and leaned back against the headboard again, staring off into space, his handsome face stern and absent, almost pouting.

Manna licked her lips and tried not to rake his body with her gaze. Instead, she looked down at her knees and asked, "What time is it?"

The chilly vacuum of his quarters allowed her no knowledge of the outside world; she had no way of knowing whether he was going to leave for dinner or roll over and sleep for the night.

"It doesn't matter." His clipped tone alarmed her. Had she upset him with her mediocre answer about her name? It had been the truth: she'd seen the word in a book and thought it sounded pretty, prettier than two letters followed by four numbers. She didn't think it was fair to pull the truth out of her and then sneer at it.

Manna turned on her side, away from him, and pulled one of the black sheets over herself. She'd had enough of him looking at her naked, in more ways than one.

There was a pause as she stared at the wall before he spoke again.

"Look at you," Ren said, sounding somewhat amused. "You care so much what I think. Just days ago you barely thought of me at all and now a few words can crush your delicate spirit."

"I _don't_ care," she murmured uselessly. He could see inside her head, lying to him was wasted effort but Manna refused to simply let him have his victory over her.

The bed shifted as he rolled on his side too, sidling behind her. He pulled the sheet away. She shivered.

"Don't," Manna whispered, not knowing what she was asking him not to do but just wanting to be left alone for a while. Already she was regretting that stupid kiss she'd pressed to his shoulder; he was probably laughing at her for that, too. _Silly thing._

The Commander ran his left hand along her back, skimming the skin with his palm. She bit her lip as he drew slow, soothing circles before roughly grabbing a handful of her ass; she yelped in surprise.

"You act as though you'd rather be somewhere else," he growled in her ear, the sudden intimate warmth making the hair on her arms stand up. "Sitting at your console, performing like a trained puppy for Hux, thinking your silly little thoughts. You act as though you don't love this."

"Don't." But her body was betraying her. Manna arched into his touch and he rewarded her with another, gentler squeeze.

"You forget that you can keep nothing from me. In fact, sometimes you thrust your thoughts upon me without even knowing what you're doing." His hand left her ass to roam over her thigh, between her legs. She wanted to stop him, out of principle if nothing else, but it only took a little flick of his hand to make her open her knees for him.

Manna closed her eyes and turned her head away from him. His voice was low and husky in her ear as he began to delicately stroke the lips of her sex with a touch so light and slow it had her trembling in moments.

"It started at night," Ren murmured. "Those lonely nights where you touched yourself in the dark. At first I wasn't certain I was hearing anything at all, you were so quiet, but you got louder until you were there all the time." The pad of his fingers grazed the extra-sensitive spot near her clitoris and Manna let out a shuddery sigh, trying to keep her pleasure as hidden as possible.

"You think so much. All those silly thoughts stumbling against each other in your little head. But at night, you were thinking of only one thing: this." He paused, then slowly slid one finger inside her. It felt so good, he was so good with his hands... She found herself opening her legs further, wishing he'd use more than one finger.

"You craved pleasure. A man's touch. Isn't that right?" Ren pumped his single finger slowly in, out, in, out. "Moan for me."

Manna shook her head stubbornly, keeping her eyes squeezed closed. She wasn't his trained puppy any more than she was Hux's.

Commander Ren responded by slipping another finger into her and increasing speed, adding a punctuated curl of his fingers that was simply devastating.

"Moan."

A moan escaped her lips and she arched into him again, humiliated that he was doing this to her, exhilarated he was doing this to her.

"Good girl. I knew you'd behave for me with the right instruction." Ren chuckled softly, then added, "I've already seen everything I need. There's not much in the way of interest, but enough to know just how to break you."

"Fuck off," Manna spat, suddenly pushed over the edge with his taunting. It didn't matter who he was, where she was, how much conditioning or reconditioning she'd have to endure. It was one thing to have him intruding in her mind, and it was another for him to make fun of her for what he saw there.

Immediately, a phantom hand closed around her throat, shutting off her airflow. She gasped for breath and found none; the fingers between her legs didn't stop.

"Oh, you silly thing," Commander Ren said, sounding more than a little amused. "You're going to regret that."


	8. Chapter 8

Through the tight, unforgiving grip on her throat, Manna found herself laughing. It was foolish, that much was for sure, but she was laughing all the same.

From nowhere, she had gained some strength. Perhaps it had just been from his underestimation of her.

"You think," she managed, chuckling with what little breath she had left, "that I'm this weak? That your fingers are all I need to become undone?"

He didn't answer her. His fingers moved unfalteringly, pumping with careful precision. Manna bit back a moan as he kept up his relentless assault of pleasure.

When she knew she had herself under control she looked over her shoulder, smiling at his handsome face as it remained blank.

Blank. She could work with that. She moved her hips back towards his, bucking her backside against the bare crotch he'd moved towards her, brushing her skin on the already half-hard cock that lay between his legs.

" _You_ forget, _Commander,_ " Manna murmured, his title tripping off her tongue in a sarcastic lilt, "that you're the one pursuing _me._ I was content to go about my silly little life as a technician and yet you couldn't keep yourself from... thrusting yourself into me."

The grip around her throat lessened. It was still there, still enough to show her he could close that phantom fist around her neck and stop her from breathing but instead he was just watching her, thick fingers moving oh so slowly between her legs, waiting for what she'd do next.

Her eyes scanned his face again; she carefully ran her tongue over her teeth, locking eyes with him, and Commander Ren's fingers twitched inside her as though against his will. The telltale hardening of his dick against her backside confirmed what she already knew. But could Manna put it to words? She bit her lip, then smiled.

"You want me so badly," she said.

Oh god, the words were a death wish, all of them signed the warrant on her ultimate arrest but they didn't stop. She was tired of it, tired of the abuse, tired of feeling next to nothing when she managed to somehow be his everything. She wished she could say he was forcing her to spew out this bile but he wasn't, it was of her own volition and it felt both wonderful and terrible all at once — especially since she knew he could hear everything she was thinking on top of it.

"You love it, too," Manna went on, poking the wound, pushing his limits. "You love how I make you _feel_."

Surprisingly, he hadn't stopped her. He was waiting for her to go on, she could feel it.

"You love the way I look at you after we've fucked." It was scary, but there was truth in this — she could feel it — so she went on, even as her voice trembled because his fingers were still manipulating her expertly. "You're... excited by me. You get excited knowing I want so much from you. That you want so much from _me._ "

"I don't want anything," he barked suddenly, but the fingers between her legs were suddenly harder than ever, faster and insistent and trying to distract her. It was the first time he'd spoken since she began her own form of assault and she felt it was a weakness.

Oh, god, a weakness. From Kylo Ren.

Manna bit her lip hard. She spread her legs even as the Commander continued to angrily pump his fingers away. It was hard to breathe, the hand around her throat was still unforgiving, but she kept locking eyes with him over her shoulder.

She was close, too close, but she didn't want to come. Not yet. There was a point to make.

She shifted her hips towards his hardness. She whined deep in the back of her throat.

"I want _you_ ," she managed.

His dark, amber-flecked eyes looked her over. He scanned her face, her chest, her body, even as his fingers flexed into her wet sex. He was clearly at war with himself, and then Manna tilted her head towards his. She ran the tip of her tongue over his full lips, then gently sucked the lower one into her mouth.

Suddenly, the hand around her throat vanished, as did the fingers between her legs. He flipped her onto her back, pressing her hard against the mattress. The Commander bucked into her, sliding into her effortlessly, his eyes wild. Manna moaned as he slipped inside her wet sex, bucking her hips hard against him. One hand went blindly into his hair, tangling her fingers carelessly in his black tresses.

In a move that surprised her, Ren leaned into her touch, pressing his face against her wrist as he closed his eyes.

For a moment, then, he was a man. Not the masked creature who taunted her in her quarters, not the cruel little boy who poked into her mind and then laughed at her. He was a man with a name — Kylo.

For a moment, Manna forgot that she was a prisoner and instead just melted into his attention, his approval. It was weak and it was stupid but all she wanted was for him to think kindly of her.

She slipped the other hand into his hair and pulled his face to her chest. He let out a low moan; his hips snapped against hers again and again, building the pleasure to a burning crescendo.

"Say it," Commander Ren murmured suddenly to the curve of her collarbone.

Before she could ask what he meant he thrust again, and again, keeping Manna on edge and uncertain. This went on for some time, keeping her at the very brink, almost enough but just not quite. She was hot and wet and ready but ultimately he was still playing with her, even without use of the Force.

As if in response, the faint grip around her throat flexed once experimentally.

"What..." Another thrust, the arm around her waist tighter.

Manna smiled to herself. She let one hand creep out of his hair and raked her nails down his back.

She could have as much fun as him.

Her nails trailed up Ren's back, then down it. He shuddered beneath her touch.

"Say. It."

Manna realized what he meant then.

She had only said it in her head before. But it was what he wanted. And, ultimately, what she wanted too.

His face tilted up to rest at the side of hers; Ren had his nose pressed against the gentle swell of her cheek.

Turning her head, meeting the tip of her nose with his, touching their lips together... Manna said, very softly:

"Kylo."

Unexpectedly, he let out a groan, louder than normal near her ear. The phantom hand around her throat twitched, grasped. He was still thrusting, slowly, carefully — before he said in a low quick mutter,

"Yes. Say it again."

Manna let the breath out between her teeth then thrust her hips against his, hard.

"Kylo."

She did it again, thrusting her hips on his and hard. The fingers in his hair curled tighter.

 _Kylo._

Suddenly the fingers around her throat were gone; she gasped as the air came rushing back into her lungs, her head spinning, and then Manna was coming, one hand gripping his hair in a sort of death vise, the other digging its nails into the flesh of his back. He let out a strangled shout and lasted only two pumps more before coming so hard his body shook with each pulse of the orgasm.

It took a while for her to find her way back into her own head. Manna tried to catch her breath, let her hands fall away from him lest he didn't want to be touched anymore, waiting for him to leap away like before. She looked at the fingers of her right hand and saw the tips of her fingernails rimmed with blood.

Ren leaned his forehead on hers, his bare chest heaving. After a moment, he pulled back just slightly to scan her face. She refused to meet his gaze and stared at the red on her nails.

Then, the most peculiar sound: he was laughing.

"You're more of a surprise than I bargained for," the Commander chuckled.

It sounded nice but she was smarter than that; Manna kept her head turned to the right and waited for him to leave.

Instead, he let out a content sigh and rolled away from her, stretching luxuriously, a jungle cat with as much grace and twice the power.

"It's late. You should get some rest."

At last, she had her answer on the time. She almost laughed herself but managed to keep it together.

After a while, he was asleep, his breaths thick and heavy as he slumbered. Manna stared at the fingers of her right hand and waited. She wasn't sure just what she was waiting for.


	9. Chapter 9

She woke up slowly. It was warm, pleasant, a comfortable feeling of being where she should. Manna stretched and contracted, pulling the body she had her arms wrapped around close to hers.

It was in that brief moment of half-awareness that she realized she was spooning Kylo Ren.

Her consciousness returned to her in a lightning bolt strike. She sat up, withdrawing from him as though he were white hot, scooting back on the bed. When had this happened? At what point in the night had she dared to entangle her body with his?

Her face was warm, her hands shaky. What a foolish idea. Her stupid racing mind had done it again, had allowed her to do something unwise, just like the actions that got her in this situation to begin with. She fell back to the mattress, flat on her back, wishing she was anywhere else.

The Commander began to stir; she shut her eyes hard and pretended to be asleep.

It was dark behind her eyelids. The mattress shifted and soon he rolled over, had his bare chest pressed against her arm. She felt the soft, warm puffs of his breath on her shoulder. A long moment passed; he tilted his head up, towards her face.

"MN-8486," he whispered in her ear, but she kept her eyes closed, tried to keep her mind blank. She pictured a huge field covered in untouched snow.

There had been many ways she'd given in to him but this time she decided to keep herself isolated. She may have buckled before but she could resist him now, she was sure.

Ren chuckled, the sound louder than she'd expected in such close proximity. She could hear him lick his lips before he said,

"Manna."

The sound of her secret name sent a shock of pleasure through her system but she tried to stay a lifeless corpse, something that couldn't be touched by his treachery. In something of a response to her decided lack of response, he ran the palm of his hand down her outer thigh, then up her inner thigh, a slow torturous path. He placed his mouth next to her ear.

"You can't deny me," Ren murmured, his voice warm and intimate in the sensitive curve of her earlobe. "I know what you want. I know what you _need._ I can break you down."

Manna kept her eyes closed. She strove not to react, kept her body rigid, waited for more. Because there was always more.

She wouldn't be broken down.

At this thought, she heard the Commander chuckle. He found her rebellion amusing.

"Oh, silly thing." Ren trailed a hand up her ribcage, over her breast, squeezed it gently. One thumb moved over her nipple in a slow, certain rhythm. "You're mine now. You know that, right? Simple as you are, you must know that." As if to prove this point he gave her nipple a little extra pressure and Manna, against her will, let out a groan. At this he laughed again, pleased with himself. A proud little boy with a dead frog he'd crushed on his own.

Manna tried to picture the field covered in snow and found the poking fingers of the Commander instead. Flat white snow... thick, deft fingers.

Suddenly his hand was gripping her chin. Her eyes stayed closed until he shook her head hard, forcing her to look at him, making her look at his horrible handsome face.

She saw his dark eyes, his strong nose, his slender jawline.

He was perfect, pristine, terrible. Manna let him hear everything she had to think about him: he was a beautiful prince, he was a horrible villain, he was a cruel captor. He was so reprehensible and beautiful all in one. If she allowed her baser instincts to rule her she would be prisoner forever, so instead she chose a different tactic.

Manna bore down and thought hard: I hate you. You're nothing. I hate you. You're nothing.

Repeat.

I hate you.

You're nothing.

Repeat.

After a moment of this, he grinned.

"Oh, I see," Ren murmured, and then suddenly disappeared. He was moving away, down towards her abdomen, so she was hoping he may be finally leaving her alone but no, he used his strong hands to spread her legs apart and then pressed his warm wet mouth against her womanhood.

The burst of pleasure it sent to her brain was almost too much. She tried to close her legs but it was too late, his hands pressed against her thighs and spread them wide open. His tongue moved effortlessly through her lips, igniting sparks of passion she hadn't known were possible. He was cheating. He was cheating the system, making her crave his touch when every atom in her body said to run. Manna moaned loudly and threaded her fingers through his hair. She pulled him against her, hard, and purred as his mouth worked its magic against her sex.

"Fuck," she muttered. Kylo chuckled a little into the folds of her womanhood and tightened his hold on her hips, pulling her closer to him.

He drew back only for a moment to murmur, "You're mine now, Manna. Mine."

In response she tightened the grip on his dark hair. Ren growled and increased the speed of his tongue, swirling it around her most sensitive spots, pressing his nose into her pelvis as he lapped away at her slick womanhood. She didn't want to give in, didn't want to let his words become true, but oh how good it felt. Sure, he might believe she was his, but at least she could make it work to her advantage.

Letting the searing pleasure assault her womanhood, Manna let out a low moan, tightening the grip in his hair yet again — a move she knew made him hard and wanting.

"Make me come." The words bubbled out of her, soft and quiet, trying to convince him she was as weak as he thought her. "Make me come, Kylo, and then you can fuck me."

She half expected the invisible grip around her throat again but instead he moaned into her, almost as though he couldn't help it. Then Commander Ren was licking even harder, pushing himself further, trying to show her she wasn't in charge.

His increased efforts had a devastating effect. Manna felt every stroke of his tongue and suddenly she was coming so hard, her fingers gripping his hair painfully tight, thrusting his face into her pussy as she rode out her orgasm.

To his credit, Ren kept licking, moving his tongue slowly along the folds of her sex. She guided him away from her as she became more sensitive, her hips twitching and bucking; he went on, slowly teasing her womanhood. When at last the afterglow had dissipated, Manna ran her hands over his slightly damp hair, stroking him the way you might a small child who's just woken from a nightmare.

She placed her trembling hands on either side of his face, tilting it away from her crotch.

"Fuck me, Kylo," Manna murmured.

His dark eyes regarded her with a sort of guarded mistrust. In response she gave her hips a gentle thrust, reminding him how warm and wet she was.

"You made me come." She raked her nails over his scalp and Ren closed his eyes in ecstasy. "You can fuck me. I..." Manna hesitated, then moved her hands to his shoulders, digging her nails into the skin there. "I _want_ you to fuck me."

He'd been so silent it was almost a shock when the Commander murmured,

"Ask me again."

A pause, and then he added: " _Nicely."_

That was not what she'd planned when this began. In fact, she'd wanted to disengage from him entirely, not entangle with him further. And yet...

And yet.

"Please," she whispered, and spread her legs further, releasing his head, letting her hand fall to her sides. "Please fuck me, Kylo."

Surprisingly, he didn't make her ask more than once. Ren pulled back, then repositioned himself over her as he put her legs over his shoulders, placing his hard cock at the entrance of her womanhood. It only took one dark glance at her for him to thrust himself inside, filling her to the hilt, making her cry out in surprised ecstasy. She was still sensitive from the first orgasm, from his mouth, and he slid in and out of her effortlessly.

"Yes," he growled, gripping her waist, thrusting forward again. He shut his eyes as he snapped his hips into hers. "Oh, yes. This is what you want. I know it's what you want."

"No," Manna responded almost automatically.

She didn't want him to own her the way he said he would. She didn't want to be his. She wasn't a silly thing.

But then he bucked hard against her in rapid succession and he was hitting the sweet spot deep within her and she was coming, coming so hard, sinking her nails into the skin of his arms as she came. The Commander chuckled low in his throat as he pumped away, not stopping.

"You're mine."

"No!"

Manna tried to picture the field of crisp white snow and then his hand was around her throat, his very real warm hand, he was choking her as he fucked her and then it was too much, it was just too much so she came again, harder than before. He seemed to feel her submission and let her legs fall to the side, pressing his chest to hers, hooking an arm around the back of her neck to pull her face towards him even as he let go of her throat.

"Yes," Kylo whispered, and kissed her hard, kissed her deeply.

It was finally too much and suddenly she exploded, every nerve ending on fire, tangling her tongue with his, bucking her hips with abandon.

It was a white-hot nova of pleasure. It spread from her womanhood throughout her body, making her equally oversensitive and numb in one grand sweep. Ren let out a strangled moan into her mouth as he came, pumping harder with every wave of his own orgasm.

She didn't know much as she came down. She knew her hands had found their way back into his thick hair; she knew she'd wrapped her legs around his middle, she knew she was still kissing the lips that were closed around hers.

To his credit, he was still kissing her too.

Manna played her tongue against his, rubbing her thumb along the lock of hair she'd tightened her grip on. The Commander grunted softly and thrust himself into her again even as he softened, his grasp on her tightening just slightly.

When he finally withdrew he was panting, pressing his damp forehead to the skin of her shoulder. She thought he might have been trembling a little.

It was the perfect time to brag, to tell him she was far more powerful than he'd bargained for. To show him that she had some control here, too. But it didn't feel right.

He was panting, leaning against her skin like a tired child, and all Manna could do was wrap an arm around his broad shoulders, wrap the other around his head to pull it close to her chest. She tangled her fingers in his thick hair and held it tight, trying to keep him near her hard-beating heart.

"Yes," Manna said softly, pressing a kiss to his temple. It's all she felt comfortable saying.

A thick silence passed between them before Kylo responded in an equally hushed tone,

"Yes."


	10. Chapter 10

It was hours later when Ren leapt from the tangle of sheets. Manna, still and curled up on her side of the large black bed, waited as he dressed in silence.

It took some time before he seized the mask from its ashy display. She had hoped he'd say something to her, anything really, and when there was the quiet _woosh_ of his mask setting back in place she panicked. Was he really leaving without saying anything to her? After their multiple... times together?

"Kylo?" she murmured, looking over her shoulder at him.

"You hate me," he responded mechanically, the vocoder distorting his voice just enough to make it alien to her. "I'm nothing."

He stood, fully clothed in black and masked once again, then strode his way right out of the quarters. The heavy door opened and closed. Manna was left alone, naked, just as she'd been the last time he walked through that same door.

She laid back against the sheets and exhaled a short, sharp breath. Manna was thoroughly puzzled; she thought he'd understood from her post-lovemaking actions that maybe she had changed her mind on him. That she was giving him a shot at being a real person. Surprise, surprise that he fell short of her expectations.

For the rest of the day she kept herself busy, hoping that perhaps her endless stream of stupid thoughts might distract him. Manna thought about the snow on the trees. She thought about how the base must work in order to destroy planets the way it was said it could. She thought about the suns that might die and the people that might perish. She thought about the person she used to be before Kylo Ren had taken her from the cockpit.

Nothing. No shutdown of her brain, no response at all. Eventually Manna just tried to fall asleep because there was nothing there to occupy herself with; sleep seemed the easiest escape.

At some point, it worked. She fell asleep — she wasn't sure what time — and when she awoke, there was a distinct rhythmic movement near her.

Manna turned towards the warm body instinctively then stopped when she realized it was Ren — and he was masturbating.

Really? After all their time together, after everything they've done... he was masturbating?

Just like it was totally normal; he was naked again and without his mask. It put her off but at the same time didn't seem that surprising. He didn't care about her at all, she was a passing phase in some twisted experiment he'd decided to pursue. He could do whatever he wanted. It's not like she actually cared about him, either.

The discreet kisses she'd pressed against him tried to surface but she shoved them down. No. She didn't care about him. He could do what he wanted.

Manna closed her eyes. She tried to picture her safe place, the field of crisp untouched snow.

"Do you want me?"

His voice was sudden, unexpected. The rhythmic movement of his masturbation went on and Manna bit her lip.

"You do. I know you do." Kyle's voice was strangely even, calm. Like he was going on about his day and not jacking off in bed next to a prisoner.

Before Manna could even respond he went on.

"What do you want me to do to you?"

She tried to roll away, tried to ignore him but the Force was nothing to be reckoned with; instead, Manna found herself whispering against her will, "I want you to fuck me... long, and slow."

Fuck. It hadn't even been something at the forefront of her mind, she'd been worrying about escaping but that was what the Force brought out of her. Her most secret thoughts. It wasn't fair.

"Oh, you silly thing," he murmured, and suddenly turned his body towards hers. His stiff penis brushed her thigh and he groped at her legs, trying to open them.

Manna felt a wild, undeniable moment of rebellion. No. No, she wouldn't be taken by him again! She tried to lock her legs, close off her womanhood from him.

Ren sidled up to her, placing his mouth next to her ear, bucking his hips against her leg.

"You can't deny me," the Commander said softly, his hands plucking at her knees to make them part. "You want me so badly. Come on, silly thing. You want this more than I do."

"No!" Manna slammed her knees together, worming her body away from his. "I don't want you! You _made_ me say that! I don't want anything from you!" With an extraordinary display of will, she threw herself out of bed and stood before him, defiant despite her nakedness. "I want to go back to work! I want my clothes! I don't want to be locked up here with _you_ anymore!"

The Commander regarded her with a decidedly surprised look; his dark eyes scanned her face, brows furrowing. For a moment he looked like a confused little boy.

Then he iced over and sat up.

"You don't have a choice," he said coldly.

"I do!" Manna covered herself as best she could, moving away from the bed. "I have a choice, _everyone_ has a choice! I don't have to be _here_ with _you!"_

Ren licked his lips in a brief, nervous gesture. He wasn't sure about her just now. Was she putting on a front or was she truly this angry?

"You better fucking believe I'm angry! I'm _angrier_ than you could ever know!" she shouted, and in the beat after the words left her mouth realized she had heard his thoughts... in the same way he said he could hear hers.

A long, tense moment passed between them. He was staring at her, hard.

"Interesting," he said at last, the word pouring out of his mouth like warm honey.

"I want to go back to work," Manna said again. There was no time to consider this new development; she had to use his surprise against him.

Alas...

"No." Commander Ren got to his feet and stalked towards her, angry purpose in every step. He seized her by the arm and dragged her back to the bed. Her first instinct was to scream, thrash, get away from him but in one lightning-quick move he pulled her onto his lap and sat hard on the bed, pulling her core towards his. "You won't go back to Hux. Do you think I'd want you on display in front of that red-haired idiot?" He accentuated these words by wrapping his long-fingered hands around her hips, guiding her towards his hard cock.

But... no.

Manna jerked her hips away and sat somewhere near his knees.

"Probably not," she murmured, and then it occurred to her. It became ever so clear what she needed to do.

She tilted her face towards his, slid a hand along the curve of his jaw, and gave her hips the slightest snap forward. Ren twitched in response, clearly expecting her to engulf him in her warm wetness, but she stayed at arm's length.

"You think you own me," Manna whispered, capturing his chiseled chin between her fingers. To her surprise, he allowed her to run her tongue slowly along his full lips. As she did, he shuddered and clamped his hands over her hips.

"I do," he growled.

"Would a man who owned a woman..." She pressed her wet sex against the tip of his hardened length; he bucked forward again. When she didn't allow him entrance Kylo let out a grunt of frustration. "...would he be chasing after her like this? Or would he just take her?"

It was a gamble, for sure, and Manna felt him shift beneath her as though to turn the tables. But she ran a hand through his hair and gripped it, hard; the sudden sensation stopped him in his tracks. Meanwhile, she sank down on him - just a little, just a bit. She placed her lips next to his.

"Or would he let her take him?" Manna whispered into his mouth.

The Commander breathed heavily. The fingers around her hips flexed experimentally. At last, he murmured:

"Let's see."

This was... unexpected. She'd anticipated that he might exercise his control over her, might use the Force. She hadn't ever expected he'd let her actually take the reigns.

The idea was exhilarating... and terrifying.

She was afraid to take the next step. And then, all at once, she realized how silly that was. He had her as his prisoner - there was no reason to hold back. It was like she was in a nightmare... she may as well do anything she could to change her fate.

Manna tilted her head, smiled at Kylo Ren, and sank down onto his rock hard cock.

She was shocked by the moan that crept from his lips as she did so but she wasn't deterred. If anything, she wanted more of that sound. Manna snaked her hands into his hair, trailing her nails along his scalp, and began rocking her hips slowly.

"Oh, fuck," the Commander managed, his eyes drifting closed.

She caught another quick snatch of his thoughts - not nearly how clear he saw hers, for sure - but still, an instant of her almost attached to his throat, licking and kissing and biting like a vampire that never intended on drawing blood.

Still rocking her hips, Manna drew back and watched his face carefully. He knew what she'd seen and he was... not frightened, necessarily, but excited. On edge. His dark eyes were watching her, waiting to see what she'd do next.

"Who belongs to who?" she murmured, then moved forward, snapping her hips in a devastating rhythm, closing her mouth over the soft pale skin of his neck. She kissed and sucked and nipped and almost immediately she could feel the telltale pulsing of his orgasm between her thighs. Just to heighten it she tugged even harder on his hair and Kylo almost shouted in pleasure, grabbing her waist hard. He twitched beneath her and let out small, short breaths.

As the bucking of her hips subsided, Manna began to withdraw. Yet as she did, Ren flipped her on her side. There was a split second where she worried what he might want from her - then he was cradling her close to him, curling his tall body along her small one, wrapping an arm around her stomach and pulling her close.

She had barely enough time to consider this before he growled in her ear, "This means nothing."

Manna closed her eyes. She smiled as the arm around her middle pulled her a little closer.

Okay. Sure.

Everyone has a choice.


	11. Chapter 11

It seemed like a series of sinfully wonderful nightmares she couldn't wake from, each of which ended with her falling asleep. Fall asleep, wake, screw, fall asleep. She had most definitely lost track of the days and it wasn't a good thing.

Fall asleep, wake, screw, fall asleep. There was all that other nonsense in between - eating, showering, etc. - but those were the most important parts. Fall asleep, wake, screw, fall asleep.

So you can imagine Manna's surprise when she woke the next morning and found something new: her work clothes, clean and pressed, folded at the foot of the bed.

Ren was nowhere in sight. She looked around the room for a moment before touching the clothes delicately, afraid they might disappear before her eyes.

Another thing occurred to her in a lightning-quick blast; the door was open.

He'd left the door to his room open. For her.

At least, that's what she had to assume, right? That it was for her?

Hurriedly, Manna put on her uniform. She shoved her feet into their boots, worked her long messy hair into something of a bun. She moved as though there were an unseen timer on the door and that at any moment it might slam shut, keeping her trapped in his stuffy quarters. The outside world beckoned like a friendly hand and as soon as she was half respectable Manna bolted into the hallway.

Once she was outside she laughed to herself and took in a deep breath of stale air. It didn't matter that the air was stale, just that it was _new,_ something different from the prison Kylo Ren had kept her in.

It was 0600 hours, but Manna wanted to get back to work as soon as possible. She hurried to the cockpit, settled at her station, and started working. It appeared whoever had been assigned in her stead had advanced the project quite a bit but it wasn't so much that she couldn't follow their lead; she picked up right where they'd left off and anticipated how she could make it better.

Soon, other techs filtered in. There was some quiet fluttering talk between them about her absence but she ignored it and kept working.

The tides turned when Hux stalked in, saw her at her seat, and favored her with a tight smile.

"MN-8486," he murmured. "It appears your reconditioning period has come to an end."

 _Reconditioning,_ Manna thought drily.

"Yes." She focused on the hardware ahead of her and tried to forget what she'd been through in the past few days. "Glad to be back to work, sir."

As soon as the last word left her lips, Manna felt a soft, feathery touch between her legs.

No. No, damn it. She'd done her time. He was done with her. He _had_ to be done with her.

Before she could even cope with the intrusion two thick, invisible fingers thrust themselves into her womanhood. Manna jerked, barely choking back a cry of pleasure.

General Hux regarded her with a suspicious look.

"Are you feeling all right, MN-8486?" he asked stiffly.

The work. She had to finish her work. Manna tried to ignore the fingers between her legs and continued assembling the tech that would help Starkiller Base function as it should.

"Yes. I'm sorry. I'm not... myself today." She gritted her teeth and decided not to let Ren have the upper hand... or any hand at all.

Hux furrowed his brow and nodded in a surprising act of mercy.

"Ah - yes. Reconditioning can be a difficult experience. Do the best you can."

Do the best you can. Yes. She could do that.

He began to turn from her when the phantom fingers started pumping in a shockingly hard rhythm and sent waves of pleasure through Manna's body. She threw her head back, biting her tongue, trying her hardest not to let Hux know she was being controlled...

 _He's too stupid to know what's happening right in front of his face._

The thought had been broadcast into her head pretty as a picture. Manna paused, her hands stilling at their work, and waited to see if there was more. The fingers between her legs stopped.

There was.

 _Let your hair down._

What? Why?

 _I won't._

She went back to focusing on her work as best she could. The phantom hands stroked her once, twice, almost more to let her know they were still there rather than eliciting a response.

 _Go on. Let it down. See what he does._

So he _could_ hear her. Manna found she was breathing heavily. The 'he' in question was most likely Hux, but why would Ren be fooling with him? He'd already said he didn't want her on display on front of the General, but maybe it was some sort of sick fantasy?

It was ill-advised and yet she pulled the tie from her straw-colored hair, letting it fall over her shoulders. She acted as though she were thinking over the tech; she knew she was probably falling right into the Commander's trap, but she had to admit... it was an interesting idea.

Hux, who had been busy at another station, flicked his gaze towards her. But sure, people tend to look at sudden motion - it meant nothing. To test the theory, she very slowly ran her hand through her loose hair.

He swallowed, looked back at the station he was inspecting. Looked back at her. Ran his tongue over his lips in a brief, compulsive gesture.

Ren's voice was in her brain again.

 _Good. Now. Play with your hair. Near your ear. Like a schoolgirl._

Manna paused, considering this, then shook her head. There was too much to lose.

 _No. I'm not going to play your game._

A brief moment passed and she could almost hear him chuckling inside her head.

 _Oh, but you should. It's so much fun. Play with your hair, silly thing._

Manna wanted to shut him out. She wanted to say no. But at the same time, she wanted to see what Hux might do.

She went on with her work and twirled some of her blonde hair along her finger, wrapping it along the digit slowly. Hux sidled closer as though he had business there, watching her.

It had worked. Ren was somewhere, who knows where, and he was watching her play with Hux. And in all honesty... it was exhilarating. It felt like having two men at her disposal.

 _Ask for his help._

Manna wondered if the Commander was touching himself. The very thought ignited a fire between her legs; she crossed them tightly and put a hand in the air.

"General Hux," she murmured, even though he was basically hovering behind her. Hux moved to her side, stiff and formal as always.

"Yes, MN-8486?"

She paused, drawing out the moment, still playing with the lock of hair she'd wrapped around her finger. In all honesty, she was waiting for more instruction.

He seemed to get the memo.

 _Bite your lip when you speak to him._

"I know I've been away some time," she began carefully, and then chewed her lower lip in uncertainty. It seemed Ren had some sort of intimate knowledge on what the General found attractive because even she could see the redhead responding - subtle as it was, it was more response than she'd ever seen from him in her work on the base. "I'm sorry you have to catch me up but - what is this new piece?"

She pointed at an unfamiliar bit of tech and her breath caught as Hux leaned in to inspect what she was indicating. He smelled good, woodsy, different from Ren. Manna hoped that thought didn't upset him but nothing came through so she took it as a win.

 _Turn to him. Put your lips near his._

The thought felt decidedly scandalous - he was definitely taking some sort of pleasure in this, whether it was sick or sexual - but he was telling her to do it. He was telling her to seduce Hux so she was going to do it, partially because it felt exciting and partially because she knew he'd end up regretting it.

Manna turned her face towards Hux's so their lips were nearly touching. She took in a breath, then whispered,

"I'm not sure what to do. Can you help me... General?"

There was a long, tense beat that passed between them. She could feel Kylo's anticipation for the reaction. And then -

The General jerked backwards, his face a mask of stiff disapproval.

"MN-8486," Hux barked, "you will accompany me to the interrogation chamber."

Wait. What?

"I'm sorry," she was already babbling, but they all knew her as a troublemaker so no one even looked up as he seized her by the arm, dragging her away. It wasn't too far before Hux had her in front of a door that looked a lot like Ren's bedroom; he put in a code and the heavy thing lifted.

No. Not again.

She struggled wildly, trying to break free but it was no use. Hux dragged her through the door and thrust her onto the floor before his bed.

"What do you think you're doing?" he demanded in a loud, clipped tone. "That sort of behavior in front of all your fellow technicians? What's your game?"

Game. She almost wanted to laugh. Fully clothed in her work uniform, released from her prison, and she'd been tricked into playing Ren's game. Again.

Manna flexed her hands, scraped from their impact on the cold floor she'd been thrust against. She thought about how to respond.

 _Tell him you want him._

Her breath caught in her throat. Did Ren really want her to do this, or was it a test? It seemed... dangerous.

 _I don't, though._

There was an almost amused pause before she heard:

 _So? Tell him you do._

Another pause, then almost a laugh in her brain:

 _Silly thing._

Ren was an impossibly confusing beast to tame, something that seemed to want her all to himself and then somehow be excited by lending her out to another. Apparently her dissection of his character resulted in a decisive action on his part: her sex was being stroked by two soft, slow fingers in a devastating rhythm.

 _Tell him. Tell him and I'll stop._

Manna closed her eyes. She tried, she really did, but when it came down to serious punishment from Hux and phantom pleasure from Ren it just became too much.

"I want you," she blurted, and the fingers between her legs stopped. The General stiffened, regarding her with a stony sort of silence.

Then, slowly, he approached her. With one hand, he grabbed her from the floor, threw her on the bed.

"You do, do you?" Hux murmured.

A long moment passed. He regarded her on the bed, let his eyes scan her form.

Without use of the Force he ran his hands along her thighs. Manna shivered as he used his palms to spread her legs wide. She had to admit, his icy stare had something to it.

And perhaps there was something to that - the fact he hadn't used the Force on her.

He was still fully clothed. He stared at her, icy eyes questioning.

Well, there hadn't been any more requests. And Manna admitted to herself... she wanted Ren to hurt, for his twisted plan to turn against him. He'd pushed her so hard for this...

Not to mention the fact that Hux was an attractive man.

The other thing she noticed was that Hux waited for an invitation. Like a gentleman.

 _He's a gentleman._

The thought was particularly hurtful but she didn't care because it happened as she started to tug off her work pants, her underwear, the things she'd been so happy to put on that morning and now mattered nothing at all. She didn't care that it was hurtful because Hux was shedding his clothing too, there was an equal exchange and so it didn't feel so bad that she was giving in to his desires. And as he sank into her warm, wet sex she just kept thinking:

 _He asked for this. This is what he wanted._

Hux was thrusting into her, grunting quietly, and she gripped his shoulders in ecstasy. She was almost there, so very close, ready to come -

No. It didn't happen.

Manna inched her fingers along his shoulders, pulled him close. Any moment now, she could feel it.

 _You think you can come without me?_

How like Ren. She could practically feel his anger. A cruel little boy who sets the rules of the game and then pouts when he loses.

She shot back:

 _I expected so, yes. After all, this was your twisted idea._

A brief pause as she kept bucking her hips into Hux's, trying to wound Ren at this point, hoping her actions were hurtful towards him.

In the meantime Hux, a decidedly quiet lover, leaned his forehead against hers. She felt bad that he seemed so passionate, so raw, and that it may all be just a move in the chess game of her relationship with Kylo Ren. Manna attempted to make up for this by increasing the thrust of her hips, trying to make him come.

The response to all of this was a hard, unforgiving thought:

 _No. This was not an exercise in you fucking other men. I'd expected you to return to my chambers._

 _Too bad,_ she thought with abandon, and then raked her fingers through Hux's hair, moving her hips liquidly against his. Hux let out a cry and came hard, bucking into her, his slim body trembling.

On his last thrust Manna came - the combination of knowing what Ren had expected and the mere physical contact had been enough to push her over the edge.

She let the peachy afterglow settle over her and dissipate before trying to tune into what Kylo Ren felt about the whole thing. As she lay naked next to General Hux, Manna chewed her lower lip nervously.

At last it came through, one hard angry thought:

 _You'll get what you deserve._


	12. Chapter 12

_You made this happen. Your stupid games._

Manna's heart was thudding in her chest even as Hux recovered next to her, wiping the sweat from his brow and closing his eyes.

Ren was displeased. In fact, that statement alone was laughable: he was more than displeased. When Manna reached out to him, tentatively, trying to see how he felt in the aftermath of her tryst with the General, she could nearly feel the rage wafting off of him like heat from a burning sun.

It wasn't fair! It had been _his_ idea, _he_ had told her to seduce Hux. _He_ had told her to play with her hair, tell Hux she wanted him. She hadn't wanted to go along with any of this!

 _Liar._

The Commander's single word sizzled in her head. It sizzled not only with his anger but with the truth to his claim: she _had_ wanted to sleep with Hux, eventually. At some point in the process of Ren's stupid game she found herself wanting to be with someone else, someone a little gentler, someone who made it feel like she had a choice.

 _Choice. You value 'choice' so much? It's overrated, you_ stupid, _silly thing._

The word 'stupid' was enunciated so hard she felt it almost like a knife in her heart. Manna had considered the nickname to be Ren's unpracticed way of showing that he had some sort of fondness for her. Now it just sounded like an insult.

Then:

 _Just wait until you leave his quarters. You can't stay in there forever._

Manna swallowed hard but decided not to give in. Not this time.

 _Oh? Like you expected me to stay in_ your _quarters forever?_

She let this land, then added:

 _Maybe I like it better here. Maybe I won't leave._

A moment of still, stony silence. Meanwhile, Hux sat up next to her, a look of confusion on his pale face.

"This was a mistake," he murmured.

It was hard to have two conversations at once, but Manna focused and tried to manage.

"What do you mean?" She propped herself up on an elbow and began toying with a strand of her hair coyly.

Hux pursed his full lips, then let his eyes wander along her naked body.

"You're a technician. This is... inappropriate." The General paused, then ran the palm of his hand over her breasts and down her abdomen. "It's just - it's been so long since I've been with..." He trailed off and let out a sigh.

 _Get his hands off of you._

The thought was so angry it almost hurt her head to receive. Manna smiled a little to herself to feel his jealousy; she was either teetering on the edge of a nervous breakdown or a death wish but it didn't really matter, did it?

She opened her legs and scooted closer to Hux.

"Everyone has a choice," she whispered, sliding her fingers over his chest. "And every man has... urges."

The General let out a quiet sound of pleasure and moved his hand lower.

 _If he touches you there, you'll regret it._

His icy eyes were inspecting her face, trying to figure out her game. He had no idea that her game was actually Ren's.

She closed her eyes and leaned her head against Hux's bare chest.

"I won't tell if you won't," Manna said softly, drawing delicate invisible pictures on his skin.

 _This is your last warning._

She did her best to shoo this thought away like a fly from warm food. She ignored Ren's anger and gave her hips a minute twitch towards Hux as though to say, go on. Do it.

Manna watched Hux's handsome face, chewing her lower lip, and held her breath as his hand hovered over her womanhood.

Then - a sudden white-hot burst of pain in her skull, a lightning bolt of agony straight through her brain. She let out a cry of shock and grabbed her head, jerking away from him.

"MN-8486?" the General barked in surprise. He moved over her, grabbing her shoulders and trying to look at her face. "What's wrong?"

As soon as he touched her the pain came again. It was unbearable, nearly blinding. She tried to form words but could only moan.

"What's wrong?" Hux cried, sounding genuinely concerned, and if she could've thought clearly she would've thought this was kind of him. To be concerned for her.

But apparently the thought was clear enough for Ren to hear it because then the pain was so much, so all-encompassing and terrible that she couldn't even hear Hux shouting at her, everything went black and then she was lost to the world.

* * *

"MN-8486."

There was a light slapping to her face as she slowly came to. When Manna opened her eyes, everything was white - almost blindingly so. Her head ached fiercely.

"MN-8486, do you know where you are?"

Med bay. She was in the med bay.

"Med bay," she murmured, finally focusing on the First Order nurse before her. The nurse smiled.

"Yes. Very good. And how do you feel?"

Shitty.

"Okay." Manna sat up and realized she was wearing a hospital gown. She blushed at the idea that Hux had, perhaps, carried her here naked.

"You're very lucky the General found you when he did." The nurse checked something on a metal clipboard, then nodded curtly. "Waiting on test results, but it must be something neurological for you to experience such intense pain that you lost consciousness."

"When he did?" Of course he had an alibi. She should've expected as much.

"Yes. If you'd been left alone in your quarters for too long, who knows what might've happened."

Of course.

Before Manna could open her mouth, a deep synthetic voice came from behind her:

"You're excused."

The nurse turned, saw the dark form in the doorway, and ducked her head down. She hurried out of the med bay without another word.

Kylo Ren took a step towards Manna, lifted one gloved hand. The door slid closed behind him.

His mask regarded her coldly. The empty eyes were like black, hollow pools.

"I release you for an hour," the metallic voice droned, "and look at the mess you get yourself into."

" _I_ got myself into?!" Manna demanded. "It was all _your_ stupid idea -"

He thrust a hand into the air and squeezed his fist closed. All the air went out of her lungs; she gasped for breath, kicking her bare legs against the hospital bed.

The Commander took a step towards her, his boots clicking. Another step. Another click. All the while Manna struggled to breathe against his phantom grasp.

Soon he was right at her side. Her vision was starting to go; little bursts of light exploded before her. At last he lowered his hand, releasing her.

She took in a huge gasp of air. The action made her head ache madly, her chest hurt with the effort. Before she could even be thankful for the oxygen the Commander seized her by the hair and jerked her face towards his terrible mask.

"If you're going to act like a whore," Ren said coldly, "I'm going to treat you like one."


	13. Chapter 13

Like a whore.

The words stung. Moreso than the ache in her skull, than the sharp pain from where he was pulling her hair too hard. She had only done what he'd asked. Maybe the problem lay in the fact that she'd like it.

Like a whore.

"What did you expect?" Manna said with a breathless laugh, looking into the holes of Commander Ren's mask. "You've kept me locked up and done nothing but fucked me senseless for days now. Maybe _you_ turned me into a whore."

A pause. The mask regarded her with silent distaste.

"No," the synthetic voice snapped. "It was your desire that drew me to you in the first place. Your lonely, lustful _thoughts_." He emphasized the last word with a sharp jerk of his fistful of hair; pain blossomed through her skull but she gave him no reaction. "You've always been this way. Don't try to blame it on me."

She stared at the chunks of leather and metal and was unsurprised to feel hot, angry tears biting at her eyes.

"You told me to do it." It didn't matter, nothing mattered anymore. He was going to torture her or kill her and it didn't matter because if she was being honest with herself she did care about him - she had felt some measure of tenderness towards him, _from_ him, and it was unfair for him to turn on her this way.

"You told me to do it, you egged me on - and _turned_ me on - and you thought I'd come running back to you and I didn't and _that's_ why you're so angry!" she spat, pulling the hospital bed blankets up to her chin for some form of comfort. There was no reason to stay coy or calm because she'd performed the ultimate betrayal, she'd given herself to someone else, Hux of all people and now he was going to punish her. The anger that had been bubbling beneath the surface since this all started was suddenly coming out of her in hot, uncontrollable bursts. "You're angry because your stupid game backfired on you and it hurts that I was with someone else and you can't deal with it! You can't deal with _anything!"_

The mask remained lifeless.

"You're jealous," Manna went on. "You're jealous of Hux and you can't handle knowing someone else was inside me. That someone else actually _thought_ about me before fucking me, that I might've enjoyed it more than I enjoyed being with you. Because with you, it's all about force. AND the Force. About me not having the ability to choose. It's about manipulation and power and I HATE IT!"

A beat.

"Do you?" his synthetic voice spat.

Her chest was heaving with angry breaths; she began to respond when suddenly every muscle in her body froze.

The Commander released her hair, carefully took the blanket from her hands and pulled it away from her body. He began untying her hospital gown from behind.

"If you hate it so much, why did you call me back to my quarters with promises of your little fantasies? If you hate it so much, why did you wonder if I was touching myself as you whored yourself out for Hux?"

She was locked, unable to respond, so perhaps the questions were rhetorical.

Ren tugged off her hospital gown and tossed it aside. She lay naked before him, unable to move. His mask stared down at her, unknowable.

"You love this, silly thing," the metallic voice said. "You _need_ someone to be in charge. It's why you went along with my game so easily. You knew I'd guide you through it and you _loved it."_

Manna couldn't respond but, deep down, she knew he was right. In a way. Why else would she still be playing right into his leather-gloved hands? Instead of responding she tried to broadcast a clear, coherent thought into his brain.

 _Take off your mask. I need to see your face._

"You aren't in charge, MN-8486," he barked, and the use of her Stormtrooper code in favor of her secret name felt like a subtle jab, another way to make her feel small.

 _Please. You're a man under the mask. Right now, to me, you're only a monster._

"I AM A MONSTER!" Kylo Ren screamed.

She tried to flinch instinctively but all her muscles were still locked in submission.

There was a moment where he seemed conflicted. Then, quite suddenly, he wrenched the helmet off his head and threw it into the corner of the med bay. It knocked supplies off of the shelves and clattered to the floor; the face he revealed was surprisingly sweaty, pale. He looked miserable.

"Is this what you're asking for?" he demanded, ripping the blanket off of her bed. He climbed on top of her and spread her legs forcibly. A shock of panic spread through her.

 _No. No, Kylo. Please._

 _"I can take whatever I want!"_ He was furious, angry beyond measure. He was moving towards her, prepared to take what he wanted.

Manna thrashed mentally but he was holding her down so hard. She had no control whatsoever. She was frightened at his anger but she hoped he wouldn't do it - he wouldn't cross that line, wouldn't take her in that way. She wasn't sure she could forgive him if he did.

Ren crouched over her, breathing heavily, rage consuming his features.

In half of a second she could feel everything he was feeling - rage, disappointment, humiliation. He had expected something from her and he had gotten something else and what's worse, he knew it was his own fault. He actually cared for her -

Manna's access to his thoughts were cut off abruptly. It was no surprise; what was coming was something too private for him to share with anyone, let alone her.

She gathered everything she had and sent through a single image: Manna holding him after the throes of lovemaking, pressing a kiss to his temple, trying to show him that she did care about him. That she knew he wasn't a monster, not really. That she was...

That she was sorry.

He hesitated. His face contorted in confusion, fury.

After a moment, Ren released her. Manna seized the opportunity to communicate by slipping her hands into his thick, dark hair, pulling his face close to hers.

"I don't want him," she whispered, the words coming fast. "I don't. I'm sorry. Please. Please understand." She curled a leg around his, her fingers working in a slow soothing rhythm through his hair. "Please, Kylo."

There was a moment where he stayed there, stone-still, his dark eyes looking at her with utter mistrust.

Then he let out a frustrated, strangled grunt and jerked away from her, sitting up. He was still straddling her crotch but staring up at the ceiling of the med bay, conflicted and upset.

"I never wanted-" Ren cut himself off and covered his face with his hands. He turned towards the corner where he'd thrown his mask as though he wanted to retrieve it.

Manna began moving before she realized what she was doing. Naked beneath him, she gently took his hands and pulled them away from his handsome, horrible face. She slid her thumbs into his palms and began to rub them slowly, carefully.

"Just ask me," she whispered. After a brief pause, Manna lowered his palms to her bare breasts and fixed them there. "Ask me what I want. You might be surprised."

The Commander let out a shuddery breath, flexing his fingers over her flesh. A long moment passed between them where she thought he might simply ignore her suggestion and go forward anyway.

"What do you want?" he finally managed.

"I want you." Manna spread her legs and slid her hands from his palms back into his thick hair, closing her eyes. "I want you, Kylo, please."

His hands kneaded her breasts tenderly; he ran the pad of his thumbs over both her nipples, making her shudder in pleasure. But his tone when he spoke next was still pouty, dejected. "I was in your head when you were with him. You loved it."

"Don't think about that," she whispered. "That's over. That's done. Now, I want you."

Manna paused, wetted her lips, then added,

"It's always been you. You must know that."

Ren continued to massage her breasts, teasing the nipples carefully. His beautiful face remained almost as unreadable as his mask.

"How could I know that?" he said softly. "I saw you with him. I saw him... inside you."

Manna looked at him and in that moment decided she couldn't wait any longer - she pressed her mouth against his, hard, and probed between his full lips with her tongue. She kissed him with abandon, tightening her grip in his dark hair.

Their tongues tangled in earnest battle before she pulled away from him, one hand leaving his hair to seek his hard cock.

"I want you," Manna gasped, guiding him towards her warm pulsing core. "Kylo, please. Please. I want you so badly."

Ren let out a strangled cry and let her pull him towards her womanhood; he pushed deep, deep inside her and the both of them moaned in complete ecstasy. His hips began to snap against hers, hard and unforgiving; Manna sank her nails into the pale skin of his back, pulling him as close to her as she could manage.

She looked at his face. His beautiful, horrible, handsome face. Manna began sucking his lips into her mouth, switching between licking and sucking, trying to keep him on edge. And it worked; he was absolutely conflicted. But the most important part was that he came, and he came hard - after a particularly slow, tender lick of her tongue along his lips he was coming, his hips pumping up into hers.

"Oh!" she cried before the orgasm overtook her, convulsing hard against his firm cock, pulsing and squeezing as she came down. It almost felt like he was riding her own orgasm - every twitch of her hips made him jerk against her.

Manna rode out the rest of her climax under him, running her hands through his hair, pulling him close again.

She pulled his head to her chest and didn't feel a resistance.

"i'm sorry," she murmured. "I don't want him."

And just as she uttered these words, over the loudspeaker that echoed through the base:

 _"MN-8486. Report to General Hux's quarters at once."_


	14. Chapter 14

Ren's dark eyes fixed her with a heated, angry stare.

"No," he murmured, withdrawing from her and tucking himself back into those layers of black robes. "No, he's not going to take you again. I won't allow it."

"I don't want him to," Manna managed, her breath heavy. "I won't let him. I won't go."

"No, you won't," Ren agreed, and lifted his hand over her body. It went limp beneath his phantom touch; she lost all movement and muscle control. Taking his sweet time, he replaced the helmet over his head. Then he wrapped her in sheets from the hospital bed, the way you might shroud a dead body.

"You're _mine,"_ he growled in her lifeless ear as he carried her from the med bay across the base.

From what Manna could hear, no one protested or said anything about the fact that Kylo Ren was carrying a sheet-covered corpse to his quarters. That in itself was a little alarming.

When he finally passed through that heavy black door he released his hold on her; she gasped in surprise, grasping at his black-clothed arms.

"You should tell me when you're going to do that," she managed, working her way out of the sheet so she could see his face. His dark, masked face.

He threw her onto the bed and watched blankly as she untangled herself from the sheet.

"Get some rest," Ren intoned in his synthetic voice. She half expected him to join her in bed but then he turned and left, the heavy black door opening and closing at his will.

Okay. All right.

Manna turned on her side, got herself situated, and tried to sleep. It took some time - so much was on her mind that it was hard to ignore it - but eventually she drifted into a fitful, unhappy slumber. She was fighting with ghosts the whole time.

* * *

When she finally came to, Ren was sitting at a console near the bed, surprisingly unmasked. His posture was unhappy, slumped. As she roused he turned to her immediately and approached, a look of unexpected excitement on his pale face.

"There you are," he murmured, sliding his hands along her bare sides. "You slept so long, silly thing, I'd begun to worry about you."

"I'm all right," she said, regarding him with some mistrust. He seemed so happy to see her it felt almost... wrong.

"Just tired?" Ren asked, moving one hand up towards her face to stroke it tenderly.

"Yeah." Manna withdrew from his touch, strangely repelled in the wake of his tenderness. It just didn't feel like Ren.

There was a strange, short shudder. Her whole world seemed to shiver and then go back to normal.

"What's wrong, MN-8486?" The Commander was concerned, his brow furrowed. He ran his thumb along her chin in a tender way, a comforting sort of action.

There was a split second of wondering why this felt familiar before it occurred to her:

 _What's wrong, MN-8486?_

A handsome, pale face contorted with concern at the pain in her head.

 _What's wrong?_

The thumb on her chin moved slowly south - along her collarbone, between her breasts. The Commander looked at her with desperate, pleading eyes and then suddenly the Commander wasn't the Commander anymore, he was the General and he was aching for her, he was wanting her desperately. She could tell just from the look on his face.

No. No, it wasn't him she wanted.

But he had been kind to her... he had been gentle. Did that mean nothing?

 _What's wrong?_

* * *

"Nothing!" Manna shrieked, flapping her hands at an unseen enemy. When she jerked awake she was alone in Ren's quarters, naked and tired and utterly alone.

She was alone and he had managed to get her here again.

She sat up and let the sheets fall away from her bare breasts. She waited, listening in hopes that he might be nearby and possibly kind but no. Alone. Naked. Stupid.

Again.

When the door of Ren's chambers slid open she knew what to expect, she knew he was there and at least she could seek comfort in him because she cared for him, she cared for him and he cared for her and there was a simple sacredness in that.

So when the figure who stalked through the door was General Hux rather than Ren, her heart sank into her stomach - and at the same time, an excited flame grew between her legs.

"What are you doing here?" she spat, crossing her thighs, pulling the sheets up above her chest.

The redheaded General paused mere feet from her, his icy eyes looking her over carefully.

"Poor girl," he murmured. "You don't even realize when you need to be saved."

"Saved?" Manna looked past him, hoping to see the Commander somewhere, expecting him to show up just in the nick of time.

"I saw what was in your head." He stepped even closer. "You need someone to take care of you. Someone who knows what you need."

Hux was right over her now; he put one hand over her chest and placed it gently on her breastbone, not grabbing or stroking... merely touching her there.

"Ren has made you think he's right for you," the General said quietly, looking over her with a decided softness. "You think you can save him but he's unsaveable, MN-8486. You must know that by now."

Manna held her breath. She wanted Kylo, she needed him but Hux was a formidable foe. He was handsome and powerful and to a certain extent he was right about Ren.

"He has poached you as a little pet and that's all you are to him. A pet." The fingers spread across her breastbone stroked her softly, slowly, sending little shockwaves through her system. All the while Hux stared down at her, his pale handsome face set in a gentle frown. "Oh, what I could do for you if you'd only listen."

"I'm with Kylo," Manna managed, crossing her legs tighter. "I... I want him."

"Oh?" His clipped, British tone was tight as he issued this dare to her. "I wonder what he might think of you after this."

Suddenly, Hux stepped towards her clasped knees and parted them forcibly. Before Manna could even respond he was pressing his full lips against her womanhood, licking with abandon. He ran his tongue slowly along the folds of her sex, teasing her carefully.

Manna moaned in spite of herself. She didn't want to give in to his tricks, not really, but it was so hard when his mouth felt so good against her.

"Stop," she murmured.

Hux pulled his face from her crotch and said quietly,

"Really? Is that really what you want?"

When Manna hesitated, didn't respond, Hux chuckled to himself.

"That's what I thought."

He went back to her womanhood and began licking hard, violently, nearly assaulting her sex with pleasure. She slipped her fingers into his red hair, tilted her head back, moaned -

* * *

"Mmmm." Kylo was humming into her sex, sending a vibration through her delicious enough to wake her from the dream she'd been caught in. A dream within a dream, it seemed.

As Manna realized where she was, who she was with, a blessed wave of relief flowed through her. She wasn't with Hux. She hadn't betrayed Ren. She -

The Commander's dark eyes flicked towards her, sensing a sudden flurry of thoughts. She clamped down hard and cut the thread of consciousness. There was no way she could let him see what she'd been thinking.

"Kylo," she murmured sleepily, tightening her grip in his hair as a distraction. "When did you get here?"

"Don't worry about that," he said softly, pausing from his ministrations to give her reassurance. He was naked, unmasked, handsome and imperfect in how tousled his hair already looked. "You were dreaming. I thought I'd wake you."

There was a very brief moment where his eyes narrowed, looking her over. She could feel the barest hint of him probing to see what she'd been dreaming about; she shut off her thought process as hard as she possibly could and saw him withdraw a bit in surprise.

"Nightmare." Manna urged his face back towards her sex gently.

Kylo regarded her with some mistrust.

"Oh?" he asked, then went back to running his tongue along the slick folds of her womanhood, teasing her towards an undeniable climax.

She flexed her hands in his hair and moaned again. The pleasure was building, blooming, she tensed against the oncoming orgasm and pushed away the errant thought of Hux's face between her legs -

"I _knew_ it!"

Ren jerked away from her, stalking across the room to pace angrily. He was still hard, aroused, but his tightly clenched fists proved his anger overcame his desire.

"I could _feel_ it! There was something - something in your mind -" He glared at her, face tight with rage, and then moved towards Manna with such angry purpose that she flinched instinctively even before he reached the bed.

"Then get _out_ of my mind!" she cried as the Commander grabbed her arm in a shockingly painful grip.

He pulled her face close to his, his fist clamped onto her wrist, his eyes burning.

"If you want him so badly," Kylo growled, "then fucking _go."_

Before she knew what was happening, he was dragging her towards the heavy door. As it opened Commander Ren thrust her into the hallway, naked and stunned, then let the door to his quarters slam shut behind her.

And then, as if to mock her, the loudspeaker came again:

 _"MN-8486. Report to General Hux's quarters at once. This is your final warning."_


	15. Chapter 15

_What the fuck do I do?_

She could only imagine what Kylo Ren was hearing coming out of her panicked, terrified mind. How she could wonder this as well as everything else was somewhat confusing but that didn't matter, what mattered was that she was naked in the base's hallway, dejected and horrified. Manna covered her breasts with one arm (mostly) and her crotch with a hand (fully) and considered which way to run. Her quarters were south, but how far? Hux's quarters, they were nearby - if she remembered correctly - and perhaps a better destination in her compromised state.

Ren would be furious with her if she went to Hux but at this point what did she care what he thought? He was a pouty, spoiled child who didn't consider her feelings for even a second. Who threw her out, naked and helpless, for his own amusement.

The click of stormtrooper boots echoed through the hallways; they were close. Manna swore under her breath and took off towards where she remembered Hux's chambers were. At least, she hoped she remembered.

Slipping on the cool floors, she scrambled down the hall and tried desperately to remember where she'd been dragged. Left, right, left, left, right -

Suddenly, a thick metal door, similar to Ren's but not as complicated. The door looked familiar. Familiar enough to take a chance, anyway. She started banging on it with both fists, abandoning her own humility in favor of sanctuary.

"General!" Manna cried, pounding so hard the bones in her hands vibrated. "General, please, I'm here, let me in!"

There was a moment where it seemed the public announcement might have been false, a cruel trick to make her think she had somewhere to go, but then the metal doors slid open and she stumbled through like a drunk after happy hour at the cantina.

"Thank you," she was mumbling, casting a terrified glanced behind her. Truth be told, being caught in the hallway naked was really nothing compared to what Ren could do to her, but it was still not something Manna entertained fondly.

The General was sitting, calm, in a black leather armchair at the foot of his bed; the look on his face changed from one of cool complacency to completely taken off-guard. He was not expecting her to burst into his quarters nude as the day she was born, that was for sure, and he stared at her as she slammed her hand against the button that closed the door.

"Why..." he began, utterly confused.

Manna leaned over, hands on her knees as she gasped for breath. She knew she was naked and humiliated but that seemed to matter very little at the moment.

When she could speak comfortably, she said again, "Thank you."

Hux took a moment to look her over - decidedly slow and deliberate - before asking,

"Why are you - without clothes?"

The phrase was so polite, so prim that Manna let out a breathless burst of laughter.

"Ren threw me out." She straightened and walked towards Hux's bed, pulling the sheet off of it to wrap herself in. When she was fully covered she walked back towards Hux's armchair and collapsed at his feet. She felt that if he was kind enough to give her sanctuary, he deserved her attention. At least.

"Threw you..." He drifted off, his ginger brows knitting into a concerned frown. "You were... with Ren?"

Oh. Wonderful.

Manna had managed, in her panic, to forget that Hux didn't know she'd been with the Commander this whole time. That he didn't know her whole experience with the General had been a game.

So... she lied.

"He took me," she said carefully, trying to plan out the whole thing before it came out of her mouth. "He came to the med bay and he took me to his quarters, he stripped me and I escaped. So now I'm here and - and I need-"

She paused, considering her dream, considering where Dream-Hux had told her she didn't even know when she needed to be saved. Did she need to be saved, just now? Or did she need a moment to figure out her next move?

"I need help," Manna finished at last.

The redhead stared her down. His cold blue eyes raked her over as she hiked the sheet further up her chest.

"Ren is... unpredictable," Hux finally murmured. "Explosive. Prone to... tantrums." He seemed to pause, consider this, then patted his thigh gently. "Come here."

Manna hesitated. She didn't want to be here, she wanted to be with Kylo but he had thrown her out and to a certain extent she wanted something better than what he gave her. She wanted what he gave her with a kinder slant, a gentler touch. A relationship where he wasn't constantly digging in her mind with his thick fingers.

She walked to the General and sat on his lap but didn't rest her full weight on him; she knitted her fingers together on her own lap and waited for more.

He just looked at her for a moment, his icy eyes scanning her naked body, then put one hand beneath the sheet on the curve of her waist.

"I'd never noticed you before that day." His palm moved over her curve towards her hips, roving dangerously close to the flesh of her ass. "You were one among many. But when Ren pulled you out of the base..."

Manna sucked in a breath, not making eye contact. There was a moment where it seemed he wanted her to respond, then he went on.

"...I saw your face. You were beautiful in your desperation." Then his fingers were tipping her head upwards so she _had_ to look at him, his handsome face was squinting as though it was trying to figure her out. "And then you came to me. You told me... you told me you wanted me."

She felt a terrible twinge of guilt, knowing that everything she'd given him had been a lie.

And then, his icy eyes locked with hers, Hux gently spread her thighs apart. He touched her so carefully along her womanhood it was like he was afraid she'd break beneath his touch.

"What do you call yourself?" he murmured, running the pads of both fingers along the lips of her sex. She shuddered beneath him and leaned instinctively against his chest; he took this opportunity to run his free hand into her hair, gripping her neck firmly.

"What?" Manna feigned innocence but she knew exactly what she meant. She also knew that the way he was touching her, the way he was holding her was dangerous, this was too intimate, too dangerous and she'd been so wrapped up in it she hadn't even considered whether Kylo Ren had been listening in her thoughts the whole time.

Well. He'd thrown her into the hallway naked, so. Fuck him.

"Most recruits don't enjoy their given codes." Hux's cool, collected tone sounded so reasonable as he dipped the tips of his fingers into her pussy. That's all it was - just the tips - and it was so calculated that it took her a moment to realize that he had taken one of his feet and hooked her legs apart for better access. "They generally have names for themselves. I'm sure you have a name you picked. Tell me."

This felt... wrong. She had a secret name, one she'd only shared with Ren - and yet, she hadn't shared it, had she? He'd _taken_ it, just like he'd taken most of his information. And feelings. And affection. He'd taken nearly all of it.

"I don't have one," Manna whispered, and to distract him from this unsatisfactory answer she pressed her lips against Hux's, probing his mouth with her tongue. It wasn't really what she'd planned but it was definitely something else to focus on... there was too much to try to deal with at the moment. She placed the palm of her hand on the bulge inside his black linen pants.

The General wrenched his mouth away from hers, his icy eyes burning with desire.

"Do you want one?" he murmured, and his fingers dipped deeper, deep enough to elicit a husky moan from Manna.

She wasn't stupid. She knew this was bad. She knew that even if she wasn't broadcasting anything to Kylo Ren he was most likely hearing every last second of her tryst. But she also knew that Kylo Ren was the reason she was sitting on the General's lap and it was his own fault and if he wanted to punish her for that then, well, so be it. If he wanted to push her into Hux's arms, that was his own god damn fault.

"No," Manna said softly as she turned her core towards his, straddling General Hux, wrapping her legs around his middle. "No. I want you, Hux."

The General looked her over, his face slack with desire. Then he withdrew his fingers from her and placed them on her lips.

Without hesitation she sucked them into her mouth, tasting herself on his skin; it was hot and tangy, a slick familiar flavor of lust.

Hux shocked her by flipping her backwards from the armchair onto his bed. He unzipped his pants and thrust himself into her womanhood, letting out a soft noise as they connected. He moved much slower than the Commander, Manna noticed dully. He thrust in, out, his ice-blue eyes closed, drawing out the pleasure in long slow sweeps.

For a few minutes, it was wonderful. He was bucking into her, one hand in her long hair, giving her the tender sex she didn't know she'd craved. In return Manna curled her legs around his middle, snapping her hips against his. She thought about Kylo Ren, knowing Hux couldn't see her thoughts, savoring this fact and wishing she could have her hands wrapped in his long dark hair -

And then Hux was sailing across his own quarters, limbs flailing helplessly until he hit a wall like a sack of wet laundry. Manna sat up, disoriented, and saw a tall dark figure at the entrance: Kylo Ren, masked and tense and furious. One arm was stiff in front of him, the hand making a spidery sort of fist towards the General.

Hux, crumpled against the wall, began to gasp for air. Ren turned, slowly, and looked at Manna.

"Stop!" she cried, bolting to her feet.

He stared at her, the empty eyes of his mask regarding her with a silent distaste, and closed his fist further.


	16. Chapter 16

"Kylo," she said carefully, lifting her hands in what she hoped was a calming gesture. "Kylo, please, let him go."

The black mask stared her down, unforgiving. Hux kicked his legs helplessly and gasped for air. His hands were clawing at the invisible grip around his throat. She managed to keep her calm demeanor intact for about five seconds, then broke.

"Kylo, please!" Manna cried. She was alarmed by the panicked look on the General's face - no, she was terrified that Ren was actually going to kill him.

"You're worried about having his blood on your hands." The cold, synthetic voice stung her with the truth it held. "You know if he dies it will be your fault."

In response, Manna scrambled across the room to Hux, dropping to her knees at his side. She stilled his frantic hands and turned to the Commander desperately.

"Fine, okay, you're right!" she barked. "You're right, you're always right because you're always in my head. Okay? But you have to stop! You can't do this!"

"Can't I?" he responded immediately.

Hux's icy eyes scanned her face, terrified, pleading.

"Let him go and I'll go with you!"

The words left her mouth before she had time to reflect on what they meant. They meant she was resigning herself to an undeniably horrible fate - pain, torture, death. But in their wake she realized all those were preferable from having someone killed because she was too reckless to keep her desires in check.

Almost immediately, Hux sucked in a harsh, desperate breath, precious oxygen flooding his lungs. He coughed once, twice, and Manna instinctively ran her hands over his chest to soothe him.

"Step away from the General," Ren's robotic voice intoned.

She didn't want to push him; she stood and took a step back, watching Commander Ren carefully. Naked before him. Again. She didn't even bother to cover herself this time.

"Walk towards me." The whole thing sounded dangerously close to a hostage situation but Manna obeyed, walking towards Ren, watching Hux to make sure the Commander hadn't closed his fist around his throat again. The General kept breathing, and that was good, but his face held a sort of wounded hurt that pained her to see.

"You said," he managed, voice hoarse as he massaged his bruised throat, "you said Ren threw you out. Then you said you escaped. Which is it?"

Kylo Ren let out an amused chuckle. She didn't respond, her skin burning with shame.

When she reached his side, Manna looked directly into the hollows of his horrible mask, staring into what she knew was really a set of dark amber-flecked eyes, what was really a man that masqueraded as a monster. She swallowed hard and managed to say, "What do you want from me, _Commander?"_

Yes, the title was emphasized sarcastically and somewhat mean, but she felt she was owed it.

He did not.

"You'll see," the vocoder said, and then all the light went out of her world.

* * *

When Manna opened her eyes, she was staring at an unfamiliar ceiling. It was pitch black, solid. She started to move and found all her limbs locked into place. But it wasn't by the Force - she was strapped into a metal contraption, one that held her arms and legs away from her body. Naked, of course. She began to wonder when clothes would become a standard again.

Even though she knew it was useless she struggled against the bonds, straining against the straps, thrashing like a mad cat in a trap.

Like he'd been waiting for her to do just this, Kylo Ren stepped into her vision, his tall form both forboding and exciting.

"Relax, Manna," he murmured in his robotic voice. "You're my guest."

"Take off that mask," Manna said softly, relaxing into her bonds. "We're both above it. You know that."

There was a pause that felt almost surprised.

"Ah." A click, whoosh as the mask came off his head. He didn't look miserable like the time in the med bay, just intense and focused. His face was tight, passionate. He set the mask on an ashy display nearby.

His handsome face was before her now. It was so beautiful. It hurt to look at and realize she might want him, but also something else.

Something where, say, she wasn't locked into a metal contraption.

Of course, he picked up on her thoughts. Of course, he found the best way to contradict the workings of her mind.

"You want me unmasked," he whispered, sidling his hips towards her captive ones. "Because you still want me to take you. Right? You still want me to take you, and take you hard."

The words were arousing but she ventured carefully into his mind and felt nothing but white-hot rage.

"You saw me with Hux," Manna said plainly. Her captive hands flexed, helpless. "You're so angry. You _hate_ me. I don't know why you even bother with me at this point. You should find someone else, you should just focus on someone else and leave me alone."

Ren pressed his hips against hers and slid a palm from her naked abdomen up along her middle, breasts, collarbone, throat. His hardened length pressed on her wet womanhood through his pants.

"You'd love that," Kylo growled. "You'd love it if you took all this time from me and then I moved on. No. No, I'm going to keep you as the pet that you are to me. You're going to stay here, right here, and obey my every whim. And you're going to learn what I want from you."

 _Pet._ Dream-Hux had called her that. _That's all you are to him. A pet._

His dark eyes scanned her face and he grimaced, angry.

"God. You gave yourself to him so easily." He seized her hips in his hands and thrust his bulge against her again. "All he had to show you... was the barest hint of kindness."

Manna decided it was no longer reasonable to fight him. Or to humor him. She decided it was time to face Kylo Ren with the utter truth. He'd find it in her head anyway.

"Kindness wasn't all he showed me," she shot back. "There was a measure of respect involved as well."

He stared at her, nostrils flaring in silent fury.

"He asked me my name, you know that?" Manna tilted her head back, defiant. "He _asked_ me what I called myself. He _knew_ I hated my stormtrooper code and so he _asked._ Instead of just stealing it from my mind like a fucking thief."

There was a pause before Ren licked his lips and asked,

"And did you tell him?"

She waited to see if he'd dig around, find the answer he was looking for, but surprisingly he didn't.

When she didn't respond right away, Manna saw him tense up. He was preparing for a blow. She considered making him wait longer but when his dark brows twitched into a small frown she buckled.

"No," she murmured, breaking eye contact. "That's my secret to keep."

"A secret I happen to know," he said softly. He paused, then touched her face with the tips of his fingers. Manna closed her eyes and let out a deep sigh of resignation. She wanted so much for him to be tender with her, for the kindness to last longer than a few moments. For him to just treat her like more than a pet.

She must have been thinking too loudly again, because then Ren added,

"It _is_ pretty."

No. Not again. They weren't playing this game. Back and forth, back and forth - "You make a move, I make a move," just like the Commander had said - someone had to end the twisted sexual volley.

Manna gritted her teeth and projected a thought for him: wrapping her legs around Hux's middle, feeling the long slow thrusts between her thighs, losing herself in the simple pleasure. She left out the part where she had wished it was Ren instead.

He jerked away from her like he'd been burnt.

"I'm not your pet," she hissed.

Kylo stared at her, clearly wounded. It hurt her to hurt him but something had to change. She just wanted to go back to work and forget any of this had ever happened.

His bruised pride was evident for only a moment before it twisted into a look of fury and he leaned in, his face so close to hers she could feel his breath against her cheek.

"That's what you think, silly thing," he snarled. "I have so much in store for you, you have _no_ idea. I am going to break you down into pieces so small you'll never even _entertain the thought_ of another man. I am going to _destroy_ you."

Manna tried to look away but he seized her chin and snapped her face back to his. His dark eyes were burning like hot coals.

"You have _no_ idea," Ren said again, and the words sent a terrified chill through her. He meant what he was saying, there was no doubt about that.

He released her face and stalked away, retrieving his mask from the stand. As he replaced it, he turned his back on her.

"But first," his synthetic voice promised coldly, "I'm going to pay the General a visit."

Before she could protest he was gone, she was locked in the strange metal contraption and she was frightened and in the end she knew it was all her own fault.

The Commander had left but he sent her a clear, coherent, _furious_ thought in his wake:

 _Silly thing. You have_ no _idea._


	17. Chapter 17

"Wake up," a husky voice was whispering in her ear.

She stirred restlessly, moving her face away from the sound. Her wrists twitched in their bonds.

"Wake up."

When Manna didn't open her eyes, a sudden slick heat bloomed between her legs. She tried to cross her knees but she was locked in place. She'd forgotten about the metal contraption.

"Wake," the low voice murmured into the folds of her sex, "up."

She opened her eyes and looked down to see Kylo Ren's face buried between her thighs. The very sight made her womanhood pulse with desire. He seemed to pick up on this.

"Mmmm, yes." He drew his tongue along her folds in long, slow sweeps. Manna bucked her hips into his mouth uncontrollably, making him chuckle. "That's it, silly thing. There it is."

"Is this," she muttered, "how you plan to destroy me?"

Ren's dark eyes glanced up at her from between her legs. The look they held was... frightening.

"Yes," he said, and went back to her pussy, sucking and licking with abandon.

"Where..." she began, then let out a low moan. "What did you do to Hux?"

The Force closed around her throat in an invisible, unforgiving grip. She chewed her lower lip and tried to think about flat, white fields of snow.

Manna held out. She held out as long as she could. She tried not to feel the pleasure, tried to pretend she was anywhere else, but suddenly the very tip of his tongue was teasing her clit and she was coming, she was coming so hard even though she couldn't grip his hair in her hands. She didn't want to let him win, let him destroy her, so she came quietly, forcing her legs to go slack.

But, as always, he was in her head. He released her throat yet stayed between her legs.

She twitched against his ministrations and didn't give him anything.

After a full extra minute of licking her oversensitive womanhood with slow, tortuous sweeps, Ren locked eyes with her. He ran his tongue over his lips and said, "You came."

"So?" Manna shot back immediately. She gritted her teeth.

The Commander pulled back a bit, relishing her captive body in the metal frame. He ran the tips of his fingers up along her sides, down her thighs.

"I can make you come again," he whispered.

Manna squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head.

"No?" Ren tilted his head and smirked. "You don't want me to make you come again? And... again?"

She shook her head.

"What did you do to Hux?" Manna repeated.

Kylo shook her hips hard enough that she looked down at him, seeing his handsome face between her legs. His dark eyes regarded her with a cold sort of amusement.

"You're so concerned about the General," he murmured. "You should be concerned about yourself."

"So what about myself," she spat.

He grinned and ran his tongue along her sex again, long and slow. Manna groaned and shut her eyes against his intrusion.

"You," Kylo said, spreading her lips even further, bearing down harder, "are _mine._ "

Her private parts burst into a sinful, wonderful pulse of pleasure. He didn't stop; he kept licking, kept sucking, and Manna's hips bucked uncontrollably. It was too much.

"Stop," she begged, but Ren kept going, forcing his face into her pussy.

"You love this," he murmured. He paused for a delicious, horrible moment, then ran his tongue up the slit of her womanhood.

Her head rolled back as she moaned, helpless.

"You want me," the Commander growled.

 _No._

The thought was singular, solid, real.

 _No._

A beat, and then his tongue kept sliding along her clit, careful and cautious.

"Yes." Ren licked her slowly, patient. He knew he could break her down. Manna felt it in his mind, a stick figure sketch compared to the Renaissance painting he could see in her own head, but she bore down and tried to focus on anything else.

 _No._

The Commander suddenly pulled back, angry, wiping his mouth roughly with the back of his hand.

"Liar," he hissed. His eyes were dark and wild; he was tugging at his crotch to release his cock from his pants. "You think you can hide from me but I know, I know you wanted me instead of Hux."

"Then why are you so _angry?"_ Manna retorted hotly.

"Because you were _with him!"_ Kylo thrust his hips against hers, rubbing his erect manhood against her slick sex but not entering her just yet. His face - which had lost its original cool composure - was furious, his full lips curled back in a snarl. "You were with _him_ and you should've been with _me!"_

"Then _be_ with me, Kylo!" she cried.

His dark eyes regarded her for only a moment - lost, frustrated, hurt - before he drove himself into her wet center.

Manna's fists clenched; she threw her head back and purred as he fucked her with abandon.

"I'm going to destroy you," he murmured, pressing his nose against her cheek, gripping her bare breasts in the palms of his hands. "I'm going to destroy you the way I destroy everything. When I'm done with you-" Ren paused, shuddering as she clamped around him, driving him towards an inevitable climax. "-ungh - when I'm done with you, there will be _nothing_ left, silly thing!"

"Is that... really what... you think?" She turned her face towards his and placed her lips against his lips. Her eyes scanned his horrible handsome face, looking for some sort of tenderness. She squeezed her thighs as much as she could with the metal contraption and felt a tightness in her chest as Kylo moaned into her mouth.

Manna paused, then whispered, "I'm not so easily destroyed, _Commander."_

Then she plunged her tongue between his lips, ravaging his mouth, bucking her hips with what little give she had. The Commander whimpered into her and came, his seed pulsing warm into her womanhood. He ran one hand up to her throat and squeezed; Manna gave into the second orgasm with a strangled cry.

He let her kiss him for a few long, sinful moments before pulling slowly away, withdrawing himself from her sex.

Manna looked at him through half-lidded eyes. She hoped he could see how much she wanted him, only him.

"Kylo," she said softly.

He stared at her. He tucked himself back into his pants. He backed away from her, his dark eyes raking her over hungrily.

He sat in a chair before her metal contraption, ran a hand through his long dark hair.

"Silly thing," he breathed.

The Force began to swirl around her exposed clitoris, hard, sucking with an almost inhuman strength. Manna cried out in shock as her hips bucked into the phantom pleasure; she didn't know what to do. There was no one there to take comfort in, no one to connect to. She forced herself to look at Ren but he was staring at her, his gaze now strangely blank.

"Kylo, please," Manna begged, but his face didn't change at all.

The pleasure bearing down on her was so hard she couldn't deny it; she tensed, then came again. This time it was almost too much; she was too sensitive.

The corner of his mouth twitched just slightly into a smile. He was going to do it again.

"Please, no," she cried, and the Force swirled around her clit hard, over her lips and along her slit. It was just too much - too much -

"I warned you, silly thing," Ren said dully, and sat forward on his elbows, watching as he tortured her with pleasure.

He stayed that way - perched with a twisted, dastardly purpose - and didn't stop for a very, very long time.


	18. Chapter 18

Every muscle in her body ached. Her wrists and ankles were sore from straining against the bonds of the metal contraption Ren had put her in. Her throat felt raw from crying out again and again in ecstasy.

Manna never knew that feeling so good could feel so miserable.

She sunk down lower into the hot bath that the Commander's stormtrooper lackeys had drawn for her. She'd been forced to stand at blaster-point, naked and sweaty and humiliated as they ran hot water into a large black tub near the back of Ren's quarters. Where _he'd_ gone, Manna had no idea. Now they stood with their blasters at the ready, faceless white masks staring at her submerged in the soapy water in case she decided to make a run for it. They didn't know running was out of the question.

"Enjoying the show?" she muttered, covering her face with her hands.

They didn't respond.

True, she was exhausted and he'd managed to chip away at some of her self-respect, but he hadn't destroyed her the way he'd promised to. Not yet, anyway.

Manna took a deep breath and went all the way underwater, squeezing her eyes closed, letting the hot water consume her.

When she came back up the stormtroopers were gone. She blinked rapidly and smoothed the wet hair back from her face. Her eyes flicked around the bathroom but she appeared to be alone at last.

Chewing at her thumbnail, she considered what to do next.

 _You'll do nothing, silly thing._

The Commander's deep voice in her head. Manna tried to pull herself out of the tub only to feel her body pulled back in by strong, invisible hands.

 _I sent them away. What comes next isn't for them._

No. She couldn't bear the thought of another orgasm even though it had been hours since he finished with her.

 _No. Please, Ren, give me a break._

Manna's captive body tensed for the worst, but when his voice came again it was softer somehow.

 _You cannot break a wild animal with cruelty alone. There must be give and take. Some good to make the bad just that much worse._

She bit her lip when she felt the tender caress of a mouth against the flesh of her throat.

 _Relax._

He drew the word out, long and low. Manna stayed tense until two strong thumbs began rubbing at the cramped muscles of her shoulders. If he had been there she would've reached behind her head to tenderly touch his thick hair, but he wasn't actually there and she couldn't really move her body anyway.

More phantom hands started to gently massage her thighs, her feet, the small of her back. Against her will she let out a quiet moan; after the hours of sexual torment it felt like heaven to be treated... well, kindly.

 _That's the idea, silly thing._

Manna had no idea where he was but she knew he was chuckling at how easily she buckled beneath any amount of tenderness from him. She just had nothing left at the moment, no fight to bite the hand feeding her. She -

 _Stop. Thinking. You're always thinking. Just... stop._

The invisible mouth kissed along her neck. The hands worked the ache out of her muscles. A set of fingers began to carefully run themselves through her wet hair.

Manna closed her eyes, a single tear slipping down her cheek, and for the moment tried not to think of anything at all.

* * *

At some point, the Commander stopped. He released her from her locked position and the water drained from the tub. Carefully - and feeling admittedly better than when she'd gotten into the bath - she got out and found a folded towel sitting near the entrance of the bathroom. Manna dried and went straight to the bed, where she collapsed into an immediate, dreamless sleep.

When she woke, she was alarmed to see Hux seated at the foot of the bed in an armchair facing her.

"What are you doing here?" Manna demanded as she scrambled to a sitting position.

He didn't answer; his pale face was contorted into a look of distaste, anger.

" _What_ are you _doing_ here?" She drew the sheets up around herself as though she had any measure of dignity left, especially between the General and the Commander.

Hux didn't answer.

"If Ren catches you -" she began, then stopped as his icy eyes flicked from her to the left of the bed, back and forth. Manna turned to see Ren emerging from the bathroom, naked and glorious. His thick, dark hair was still wet from the shower. He spotted her awake; he looked from her to the General as his full lips spread into a sly grin.

"You always think you're one step ahead," he murmured, approaching the bed with the slow pace of a predator. "You're always wrong."

"What is this, Kylo?" She was starting to get up but the Commander waved his hand at her and she was forced back down.

Hux's mouth tightened. He seemed to be frozen into place - Manna knew that position quite well indeed.

She put the pieces together fairly quick.

"You're going to make him watch," Manna said, grimacing.

Ren tilted his head at her. The smile remained on his face. It wasn't particularly pleasant.

"More bad, Ren?" she asked with genuine dismay. "So soon after the good?"

"Oh, this won't be so bad. Not for you." He shot Hux a smirk and slid onto the bed, on top of her, slipping a hand into her long blonde hair.

She could see the General struggling against the Commander's Force but his fingers barely twitched.

"Please?" Manna cradled his handsome face in her hands, hoping for some measure of mercy. "Please, Kylo, just a little more time. And not with him here. Please, I'm done with Hux, I'm staying with you, some part of you must understand that. You can see everything, hear everything. You don't need to do this."

"This isn't about _you,_ silly thing," he murmured. Ren took a handful of hair and pulled it lightly, urging her to shift in position on the bed. Now she could see Hux's angry face - and Hux could see all of it. "It's about _him."_

The Commander leaned her face back and ran his tongue along the curve of her throat.

Manna couldn't look away from the General's icy blue eyes. She wanted to, really, but she couldn't, and it was horrible. It was even worse when Kylo began to roll one of her nipples between his fingertips and she moaned in pleasure; the look on Hux's face shifted just slightly from anger to hurt.

"Kylo," she whispered, but he grabbed her face and snapped it back towards his.

"We're done talking," he growled, then smashed their mouths together in a passionate kiss. Manna resisted as long as she could, trying to keep from responding, but then he thrust two fingers deep into her wet sex and she gasped in surprise. It was like her tongue had a mind of its own - no, that was probably the traitorous spot between her legs making her kiss him back.

He slipped an arm around her waist, pulling her hips closer to his but not entering her, not yet.

There was a quiet sound from the end of the bed, a soft growling noise. Manna chanced a look over at Hux and felt a guilty twinge to see him struggling to speak - but failing.

She pulled back a little and faced Ren to ask him again please, stop this, but he pumped his fingers harder still and made her whimper.

"You don't want me to stop," he hissed in her ear. "You don't want me to stop. You don't."

In an almost fluid move he pulled his fingers from her and placed his hard cock at the warm, ready entrance to her womanhood.

"Look at him."

"No," Manna whimpered. She didn't want Ren to take her with Hux watching like a prisoner, but after the hours of torture, after the tender time in the bath... her will was weak.

In response to this thought the Commander immediately took her face in his hands and stroked her cheeks with the pads of this thumbs.

"Oh, silly thing." The words came out in a murmur; his dark eyes regarded her with a kind of pity. "Some kindness? Is that what you want? Like the kindness _he_ gave you?"

Helplessly, Manna glanced over towards the General. Hux's mouth twitched hard into an unhappy grimace.

She shook her head in desperation but Kylo smiled knowingly.

"Yes. Yes it is. Oh, you silly thing."

He leaned in, slow, and began to kiss her so softly, so carefully, that the action nearly broke her in two. Ren slid his hands back into her hair, caressing it, and kept moving his lips on hers. It was such a difference from the way he normally kissed her that she barely realized that he had slipped his cock between her thighs.

Manna whimpered as he pumped his hips slowly - in, out, in, out - and found herself snaking her arms around his neck, pulling him even closer. It felt so good. Too good.

"Do you like this?" Kylo whispered in her ear. "Is this what you want?"

"Yes," she responded almost immediately. She kept her voice low, hoping Hux wouldn't hear. He wasn't forcing her to look at the General for the moment so she let herself feel everything with abandon.

"And this?"

The Force began caressing her clit with a delicate touch. With his hard manhood gliding in and out of her, the extra sensation was devastating - but in the best possible way.

"Yes." Manna pressed her forehead into his hair and inhaled its rich aroma.

"Louder."

Kylo had increased his speed just a little; she moaned against her will. By god, he was breaking her down. He was doing exactly what he said he would: he was destroying her.

"Yes," she said, her volume rising slightly. She hoped Hux couldn't hear her but knew he could.

The Commander grunted and bucked his hips harder, yet still managing to be gentle, still running his fingers along her scalp. The Force slowly moved towards her secret spot, just to the right of her clit, and caressed with utter precision.

"Louder, silly thing," he snarled in her ear, and then she was coming, her pussy pulsating with an earth-shattering orgasm. Manna was barely aware of it but she was nearly screaming in pleasure, her hands gripping the pale skin of Ren's back, her legs quivering, pressing her face against the fragrant crook of his neck.

In the last few seconds of her orgasm she closed her mouth around Kylo's throat, kissing and sucking. He groaned loudly, his hips speeding up, and when she threaded a hand into his hair and gave it a harsh tug he thrust one more time and then came with a deep-throated cry.

He pulsed warmly into her sex; as they both came down, he stroked her tenderly - her face, her hair. She couldn't remember if she'd ever felt so cherished.

Then Ren turned to Hux, still locked in his chair, and smirked.

"She calls herself Manna," he managed, breathless.

Then all at once the General was free; he jerked out of his chair, hiding an undeniable erection behind his hands, and fled Ren's quarters. The heavy black door opened for him and closed once he was gone. Even in the wake of her afterglow she felt an ache in her heart for him - she had wanted so badly not to hurt him.

Kylo looked back at Manna and favored her with a softer smile. His thumb returned to her cheek and he stroked it with a gentle reverence.

"Oh, well done." He placed a chaste, careful kiss against her forehead. He hesitated, then placed his mouth next to her ear.

In her infinite ignorance, she expected to hear something kind next. As usual, she was wrong.

"He will remember that," Ren whispered.


	19. Chapter 19

"That was cruel, Ren," Manna said when the feeling had returned to her face.

The Commander smirked and rolled onto his back, folding his arms behind his head.

"He needed to be taught a lesson," he murmured thoughtfully. "Sometimes the best way is to simply... rub their noses in it."

She didn't appreciate the metaphor. It felt filthy, the leftovers of garbage juice on skin. She closed her eyes and tried not to think about what she'd just done. What'd she'd been doing.

He caught wind of her unhappy thoughts and rolled back towards her, strangely playful in his movements. Like a puppy with razor-sharp teeth. He placed a hand on her arm and leaned his nose against her shoulder.

"Oh, silly thing, you were so happy only a moment ago."

When she didn't respond, his hand crept up towards her face and turned it in his direction.

"What do you need from me?" Ren's dark eyes met hers. He squinted a bit, then smiled. "This?"

He favored her with a tender, loving kiss. Manna hated herself for melting into his touch, for giving in to him yet again, but then he was cradling her chin between his thumb and forefinger, holding her like a delicate piece of porcelain.

 _Shit,_ she thought helplessly.

In response, Kylo flipped her over onto her back without breaking the kiss. He slid one hand into her hair, pulling her face towards him, gently massaging her tongue with his. Manna tangled one of her legs around him and placed her hands on his chest. His heartbeat pulsed beneath her palms.

She was almost ready to believe that he truly cared for her when he pulled back and regarded her with an amused sort of disdain.

"You're so desperate for affection," he said softly. "So lonely. You always have been. Is this all it takes to make you... so pliable? Such warm putty in my hands?"

All the tenderness, the sweetness. It was a farce. A lie. Her cheeks burned with shame.

Manna shoved at him, hard, forcing him away from her naked body.

"Fuck you, Ren," she spat.

"You've already done that. In spades." He was laughing as she scrambled off of the bed. Laughing at her.

He was always laughing at her.

"I don't want to be here!" Manna cried. She looked around for something to throw and spotted his mask on its ashy display; she seized it, then hurled it at the wall furiously. She had moved before he could stop her - mostly because she had acted before she'd even thought about it.

"I hate you!" she went on, naked and outraged, her hands coated with ash. "I hate you and I want to leave and I don't ever want to look at you ever again!"

The Commander stared at her from his languid position on the bed. He looked almost surprised.

Then, he said,

"You're lying."

Manna opened her mouth to respond and he lifted a hand, freezing her in place.

Slowly, like a lion stalking its prey, he emerged from the bed. He walked towards her, each step full of purpose. His dark eyes were fixed on her and burning.

She felt her mind being raided like a wealthy bank's safe. He was taking everything he needed.

"You're angry," Kylo said gently as he began to circle her, a vulture eyeing a dead thing in the desert. "You're angry because I see you for what you are. I see that, on a certain level, you _liked_ what happened with Hux. You _like_ how I control you."

Manna winced and tried to flex against his Force. Of course, it was useless.

"You _like_ the way I make you feel." He kept circling her, his eyes raking her over hungrily. "You _like_ that I'm keeping you as a pet. You say all these stupid little lies to yourself but you don't mean any of them. Do you, silly thing?"

She grimaced, opened her mouth to disagree, and then heard herself saying,

"No. I don't." She tried again to say differently and instead blurted, "I want you. All the time. I'm just afraid."

Ren tilted his head, surveying her.

"What are you afraid of, silly thing?"

"That you'll get tired of me," she said against her will. "That you'll get bored. That you'll go."

There was a pause. The pause felt almost earnest. Sincere.

When the Commander circled back to her face, he lifted two fingers and caressed them along her cheek - gently.

"Manna," he murmured. The sound of her secret name in his mouth, not mean or hateful, made her heart twist into painful contortions.

She squeezed her eyes closed. He didn't say anything; when she opened her eyes again and scanned his beautiful, horrible face, she prepared for the worst.

"What, Ren?" Manna said in a defeated breath.

Another long pause.

"Call me Kylo," he whispered into the curve of her ear. And, after a beat: "Please."

Manna let out a choked, sad burst of laughter.

"Why should I give you anything?" She looked him over; he was terrible, wonderful in his cruelty. She wanted all of him and none of him at the same time.

There was a very long pause as he looked her over. He seemed to take in every fiber of her.

"Because," Ren murmured, continuing to caress her cheek, "you belong to me."

She shook her head and looked back to her feet.

"No. I don't."

His bare chest heaved with an angry breath, but he kept his anger in check and began to stroke her skin again.

"Silly thing." His whisper was so soft she hardly heard it; he pressed his lips to the corner of her mouth, just barely, then leaned his forehead against hers. "It's not a weakness."

He seemed like he was about to say something else, then lifted a hand before her face, his own grimacing with dismay.

"Sleep now," he soothed, and then she was gone.

* * *

He left her alone for a few days after that. God knows where he went, but he left her alone. She went through the motions - eating the meals that were brought to her, showering regularly, sleeping and sighing and waiting - and just laid in the bed, staring at the heavy black door. Manna didn't try to leave. The blasters pointed at her face when the daily meals were presented to her were enough of a deterrent to keep her motionless beneath the sheets.

At first she was relieved. She felt a sense of lightness to not spot his tall figure in a corner, watching her, ready to pounce.

Then she began to miss him.

Manna tried her hardest to deny it, to put it in a dark place of her mind where he couldn't find it, but soon she found that he wasn't even looking anymore. Something about that made her so sad that her heart actually ached in her chest.

Damn it. Every time she thought she had wormed her way out of his grasp she found herself firmly stuck back in his long, slender fingers.

 _It's not a weakness._

After the third day she started to think, and think loudly.

She thought about running her hands through his thick, dark hair. About trailing kisses down the pale skin of his throat. About her tongue tracing delicate patterns across his stomach, over his hipbones, towards the throbbing erection between his legs...

And then she stopped. And started over.

Hands in his hair, kissing his neck, tongue down his torso.

Stopped. Started over. Always just before she reached where she knew he wanted her to be.

It only took about 20 minutes before the heavy black door wooshed open and the Commander stalked inside, wrestling the helmet from his head and throwing it into a corner. He was advancing on her like an angry jungle cat, taking his robes off as he went.

"I was doing important work, silly thing," he growled, dropping his cape to the floor. "I was doing important work and you decided to play this filthy game."

"You left me alone," Manna said, but she was opening her legs for him already, leaning back, ready for him to take her.

"Oh no." Ren climbed on the bed, naked and furious, and gripped the back of her neck with one strong hand. "You're going to do what you promised."

The days of isolation had made her reckless, desperate for any sort of attention. She laughed breathlessly in his face.

"Or what?"

He shook her the way you would a disobedient dog.

"Or I do far worse than leave you alone in my quarters to be taken care of like a pampered little pet," Kylo snarled.

She bit her lip, looked him over, then smiled.

"Lay down."

The Commander scanned her face, skeptical, before releasing her and laying on his back. His manhood was already erect, waiting.

Manna ran her hands along his thighs. She skimmed her nails along the dark hair around his pelvis; Ren let out a quiet moan, bucking his hips towards her. His dark eyes stared her down, daring her to do more.

She had missed him so much. She had missed not just his body, but how he looked at her -

Manna cut this off and instead circled his hard cock with her thumb and forefinger, holding it tight and angling it towards her mouth. Carefully, she extended the tip of her tongue and ran it in a careful, teasing circle around the head of his dick.

Ren moaned loudly and bucked his hips again.

An echo of their tryst before Hux sang in her brain, and Manna couldn't resist shoving it in his face. Rubbing his nose in it, if you will.

"Do you like this?" she murmured, and ran her tongue along his swollen head in a devastating sweep. "Is this what you want?"

"Fuck, yes," he groaned, and she took all of him into her mouth, sucking as hard as she could, running her tongue up and down his hard length.

She gave him a minute or more and when he began to buck his hips harder into her Manna pulled away, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand and laughing.

"You think you can just leave me here until you want me again?" she demanded. Ren sat up, his face flushed and furious.

"Don't stop," he snapped.

"I'm _not_ your pet!" Manna set her jaw and stared him down. "I'm not your plaything. I'm real. I'm a real fucking person!"

Kylo paused, considering this, and for a wild moment she thought he might actually strike her. Then he was moving on top of her lightning-quick, spreading her legs with his knee, thrusting himself deep inside her warm center.

But instead of ravaging her like she expected, the Commander began pumping his hips in a slow, careful rhythm.

"Silly thing," he whispered in her ear, snaking one hand into her hair to cradle her head tenderly. "You think I don't care for you? You think this is all just a game?"

"Yes," Manna responded immediately. Hot tears were biting at her eyes and she tried not to give him anything but she found herself wrapping her arms around his neck, pulling him close, burying her nose in his hair.

"Oh, Manna." Ren kept his rhythm slow, careful, but she could tell he was struggling not to thrust harder, not to come sooner. He had a point to make. "If I didn't care... you know how easily I could dispose of you. Don't you? You know how simple it would be to find someone less difficult?"

She didn't answer and instead spread her legs wider for him.

"Poor, silly thing," he said, then moaned softly as he bucked into her again. "I stayed away because I wasn't sure what I would do to you. After seeing how desperate you were for my affection. I... was afraid."

Another long silence as he fucked her and then the Commander added in a hushed, solemn voice,

"I destroy things. I destroy everything."

Manna paused, considering this. Then she began to buck her own hips into his, harder, increasing the friction. He let loose a groan almost immediately.

"I already told you," she whispered into his ear. "I'm not so easily destroyed."

He bore down onto her, hard. She pulled him as close as she could. Soon, their hips were moving at a frantic pace; it only took a few more thrusts for her to cry out in ecstasy as she came around him. Ren came just after, clamping his thighs against her, shuddering and whimpering as his climax washed over him.

She waited for him to withdraw. To pull away, to leave. Instead, he stayed on top of her, his chest heaving. He stayed inside her.

Manna hesitated, then ran one palm along his back slowly, tenderly. When he didn't say anything, she murmured,

"It's all right."

"You don't know," he said miserably, pressing his face harder against her shoulder. "You don't know what I thought about doing. To you. Just because you made me angry. Because you were with Hux. Because punishing him wasn't enough. I wanted to-"

"It's all right," she said again.

He withdrew from her but didn't move much; he stayed on top of her and kept his body pressed on hers.

"Is it?" Kylo asked, and she had no idea how to respond.


	20. Chapter 20

After a few moments, the Commander rolled away from her, laying on his side. He stared at the wall and said nothing.

"Ren," Manna murmured to his back.

He didn't respond.

"Kylo," she tried instead.

Nothing.

She ran her fingertips along his spine, stroking the pale skin carefully, savoring how soft he felt. He remained silent, save for a quiet sigh.

"It's all right." Manna chewed her lower lip, then nodded, almost as if she were convincing herself as well as him. "It's all right. It doesn't matter what you thought. Just rest. Relax."

Her hands caressed him carefully, drawing delicate little sweeps of touch over his back. She pressed her face against his skin.

"I'm not afraid of you," she whispered.

He said nothing; Manna kept touching him until she found herself drifting into a dreamless sleep.

* * *

She woke and he was nowhere in sight.

Manna gripped the sheets in angry fists and exhaled sharply through her nose. He was gone again. He'd said he wouldn't go, and he'd gone.

She let loose a laugh that sounded harsh, foreign to her own ears.

It was hard to admit she wanted him around. It was harder to admit she _needed_ him to be nearby, that without him she didn't feel like anyone that mattered.

This thought no doubt floated through Ren's mind but Manna remained untouched, unaffected by his phantom hands. She got out of bed, took her shower. She anticipated her daily breakfast - as she'd grown so used to receiving. The stupid, simple routine of her life as a captive, unwanted thing.

Manna walked out of her shower, wet and warm, and was surprised when Ren seized her roughly around her waist from behind.

"Hello," he said, like it was normal, like their interaction was an easy first-date sort of romance.

"What are you doing?" she murmured. He hooked her closer, encouraged by her words, and placed the tips of two fingers at the entrance to her womanhood.

"What you want," the Commander said, and then his fingers were moving so softly, so carefully she moaned in ecstasy.

Ren pressed his lips against the skin of her back, then smiled on her skin.

"This?" he teased, dipping his fingers inside. He used his arm to pull her even closer.

Manna sank down onto his long, slender fingers, waiting for him to ravage her.

But that wasn't what he had in mind. Every time she thrust towards his fingertips he drew back; he constantly maintained a very slight penetration, moving the tips of his fingers ever so slightly, enough to drive her wild but not enough to be... enough.

She tried to jerk her hips away from him, frustrated, but the arm around her waist held her still.

"Allow it." His voice was like warm honey in her ear. Manna sighed, then tried her best to let her body go slack, to relax into his touch.

"Why?" she asked breathlessly.

"Because," Ren hissed, the tips of his lips brushing the lobe of her ear and making her shiver all over, "it's what you want. You just don't know it yet."

His fingers moved expertly between her legs. They were only dipping in about half an inch but moving around in a careful sort of pattern; he knew he was turning her on beyond belief. Manna closed her eyes, still bent over and held captive by the Commander, and tried to send him a vision -

But it was cut off so fast that she jerked against him, startled.

"You're not going to control this, silly thing." The arm around her waist tightened, the fingers between her legs pumped just a little harder. "This is about _you._ And about what _you_ want." There was a brief, tense pause, and when he spoke again he sounded nearly breathless. "Tell me what you want."

His fingers moved just a little faster. Manna's hips shifted uncontrollably into his touch; what he was doing was perfectly terrible. He was caressing her sex in a way that was nearly enough... but just short of it. The pleasure was there... but not what she needed.

Not what she wanted.

"I want you," Manna said, and she meant it. Not because his fingers were teasing her to the edge, not because she wanted to placate him.

Because she wanted him.

"Again," Ren whispered, and she could feel his erection against her backside. He was pressing against her, wanting to enter her but waiting, waiting for her to give him the invitation.

"I want you." When she said it again, she said it with more determination, and she bucked her hips back against him.

He went on teasing her for another minute or so. His fingertips dipped carefully into her warm womanhood, working slowly, making her moan in ecstasy.

She had no idea how long he'd planned on tormenting her when suddenly, blessedly, he placed the tip of his cock against her sex.

"For you," Ren said softly, and then thrust his hips forward with such a tender rhythm that Manna wished she could see his face.

Slow. In, out. In, out. Every thrust felt like a gift, a special kiss on her skin.

She wanted to see him. She wanted to hold his cheeks in her hands and kiss his eyelids, to moan quietly into his ear and thread her fingers through his hair.

He didn't let her do any of this. He held her, bent over, and kept fucking her at a devastatingly slow pace. One arm was wrapped tightly around her waist, the other crept up to knead one of her breasts. He was breathing heavily in her ear.

Manna knew she was about to come. She was about to come and she didn't want to; she wanted him to face her like a man, to stop terrorizing her with the skillfulness of his hands. In response to this thought Ren moved the hand from her breast to her clit, massaging it with a ruthless sort of precision.

"Come now, silly thing," he growled, and to her dismay she did.

She came hard, whimpering like a child, convulsing against him helplessly. Her writhing pushed him over the edge into his climax and the Commander pulled her hips even harder against his as he rode out his orgasm, letting out a strangled cry as he emptied his seed into her.

The warm pulse of pleasure flowed through her, but when it began to fade Manna felt something else. A sense of... defeat.

So he'd gotten his way, again. She'd lost, again. She'd been tricked, manipulated, used... again. But that wasn't all. He had to destroy her.

She wasn't going to let him. She wouldn't be a trophy, another broken thing to add to his list of destruction.

He hadn't even released her yet when Manna said hotly,

"I'm done. I'm leaving. This is enough."

Still inside her, Ren pulled her even closer to him, wrapping his free hand around her throat.

"You think so, silly thing?" he breathed. "We haven't even _begun."_


	21. Chapter 21

The hand around her throat was enough to send a thrill of desire through her - but not enough to make her turn back. Not this time.

"No," Manna said hotly, trying to straighten out of his grip. "I'm serious. I'm done. I want to go back to my room now."

He chuckled and gave her no leverage, one arm still tight around her waist.

"You think so?" Ren whispered into her ear. He began to say something else but that was when she summoned all the mental courage she had and projected one fierce, furious scream into his brain.

The Commander dropped her at once with a surprised cry. He'd been holding her so tightly she fell hard onto the ground; it only took her a moment to scramble to her feet and face him, naked, enraged.

His handsome face was tainted by confusion, as though he truly didn't understand why she was doing this.

"I want," Manna said through gritted teeth, "to go back. To my room."

They faced off, old adversaries, predators in the heat of battle.

She didn't back down. Neither did he.

"You can try to leave," Ren growled at last. "Go on. The door is right there."

He jerked his head at the heavy black door behind him. His body was tense, ready to pounce. The dare felt dangerous. It felt like a heated jab that she'd be unwise to respond to.

Manna straightened and crossed her arms over her bare breasts.

"These games, Ren," she said softly. She was trying to address him as a person rather than a captor, but she had no clue if it was working. "They can't go on. I'm tired. I don't want -"

She took a breath, sighed, looked at the floor.

"I don't want to do it anymore. I want to go. I want to be... free."

Her gaze remained fixed on the ground. He said nothing.

When the silence became too much to bear, when she realized the warm seep of his seed was dripping down her leg, she looked up at him.

The Commander's face was full of unchecked fury. He was daring her to go on, to demand him to let her go.

He was beautiful in his anger, but that was the source of his beauty: anger. And she was done with it.

Manna searched him for some mercy. She thought maybe he'd relent. He'd open some sort of softness to her.

Instead, his muscles seemed to tense further. He squared his shoulders and dared her to pass.

It was then she realized it was all a show. A silly little farce to keep her in check. The realization made her laugh out loud, a hysterical sort of sound.

"I'm going," she said at last, and began walking past him. She went to the door and waited for it to open.

Kylo turned towards her, his chest heaving with breaths of rage.

"You'll just go back him," he barked, and for the first time he sounded somewhat scared.

"Why don't you let me go," she murmured, heart hammering against her ribs, "and see what happens?"

There was a tense, horrible pause. Then the door slid open.

She didn't have much time; Manna bolted back towards the bed, seized a sheet, wrapped it around her. Once she was properly covered, she scrambled back into the hallway and started trying to figure out where her quarters were in relation to Ren's. The base was pretty big, after all, and it had been some time since she'd been there.

Manna only encountered a few stormtroopers on her journey home. They gave her the same blank, masked look that her unclothed self deserved, but soon she was back in the place where he'd found her and the metal door closed behind her and she allowed herself to start crying.

She had no idea what, exactly, she was crying for. Was it for her lost innocence? For the fact that she'd given herself to a man who proved to be a monster? For the idea that she'd willingly tricked _another_ man into thinking she had feelings for him, then _actually_ having feelings for him, then watching him be destroyed before her very eyes? For the idea that Kylo Ren had managed to utterly destroy everything about the person she considered herself to be?

She didn't know. She had no energy to figure it out.

And so she cried, and eventually fell asleep on her bed, naked and yet still half-wrapped in the sheet from the Commander's bed she'd taken in her hasty escape.

* * *

 _It's late. Wake up, Manna._

The thought poked at her brain with gentle fingers, prodding her up - not roughly, but carefully, a soft sort of rousing. The way you might try to rouse a sick patient awake in the most tender of ways.

 _Manna. Please, wake up._

She was only partially awake but the affectionate tone caught her ear, bringing her further into consciousness.

When Manna came to she was, surprisingly, alone in her quarters. Still naked in a tangle of both her sheets and the one she'd taken from Ren - a decidedly apt metaphor if she'd ever seen one - and she put her her head in her hands.

 _Manna?_

A careful pause, and then:

 _You're not with him, right?_

The thought hit her with such tenderness, such soft vulnerability that it made her heart ache in her chest. That, and the fact that he hadn't just looked to see for himself. After all, there were no secrets in her mind that could be kept from the Commander. Not if he chose to look.

 _No, Ren. I'm alone._

She tried to give the thought a calm but firm feel to it - yes, I'm alone, but no, I won't come back. Manna couldn't do it anymore, the endless back and forth of kindness and cruelty. If her life with Ren had to be like that, she'd rather have her old life instead.

 _Would you... like some company?_

Manna laughed aloud in the empty quarters. Good god, he wasn't giving up. He was never going to give up.

 _I'm tired._

 _No you're not. You've been sleeping for hours and hours, silly thing._

She ran a hand restlessly through her hair.

 _That's not what I meant._

A pause, and then:

 _I know._

Manna drew her knees up beneath her chin, considering the silence that followed. She stared at the black sheet from Red's bed tangled with the white one from hers. The contrast. Dark and light.

 _Kylo?_

He responded almost immediately.

 _Yes?_

She laid on her back, closed her eyes.

 _Look._

Rather than a sense of his fingers poking around, she felt the very distinct sensation of being watched - and intently. Good.

Manna slipped a hand down her stomach, fingertips trailing over her womanhood. She could feel him, wherever he was, tensing in anticipation. She ran her tongue along her lips and began touching herself slowly, sensually, relishing the fact that for once, she was in charge.

As she touched herself she thought of what she wanted. She thought clearly, and loudly.

She thought about Ren holding her in his lap as she rode him, his arms circling her waist in a gentle embrace. His lips pressing soft, tender kisses to the skin of her neck. His dark eyes looking at her, only her, with a level of tenderness she'd never truly seen.

Manna let out a little moan, her breath coming faster, feeling her orgasm approach sooner than she thought. She wondered if the Commander was touching himself too.

The very thought pushed her over the edge, pleasure washing over her in waves, turning her head to the right and curling her toes as she came.

For a few minutes, it was quiet. She lay on the bed, breathing heavily, staring at the ceiling and running her fingers along the black sheet. In a surprised instant she realized that it smelled like him.

Then, in the stillness of her lonely quarters:

 _I'm coming to you, silly thing. Please be there when I arrive._


	22. Chapter 22

As soon as he walked through the door - it opened on its own, under the clear influence of the Force - he wrenched off his helmet. And then he stood there, staring at her, his dark eyes darting over her beneath the tangle of sheets.

"You're so beautiful," Ren said softly.

The door slid closed behind him with a quiet _woosh._ He set his helmet carefully on the ground.

"I want to make love to you," he murmured. He hesitated, then took a step towards the bed, his hands moving to undo his cape. "Is... is that all right?"

He was trying. He was trying so hard. Manna chewed her lower lip for only a moment before nodding.

The Commander let his cape fall to the floor. He was reaching for his belt before she interrupted, in a sudden brave moment:

"Wait."

He stopped.

She took in a deep breath, then looked him over thoroughly.

"The boots, first."

Kylo hesitated, then smiled. He knew what she was playing at, and it seemed he was happy to play along - for once.

He tugged off his boots, not breaking eye contact, and discarded them. He waited for more.

Manna leaned back into the pillows, keeping her gaze locked on him, and began to touch herself again. Beneath the sheets, where he couldn't see exactly what was happening: just a lewd silhouette of her legs spread wide.

"The robe next," she ordered huskily. If he was going to be in her life, she was going to make him earn it.

The robe went over his head in a moment after a little bit of struggle. He stood there before her, pale and lean and glorious. She could see his impressive erection straining at his black pants.

"Now the pants," Manna said, "slowly."

Ren's mouth fell open in something of a heated moan; he stripped off his pants and took another step towards the bed.

Now he was naked, hard and glorious before her. Manna could've let him ravage her, wanted him to, but something in her made her inch towards the edge of the bed and pat the mattress.

"Here."

Kylo crawled onto the bed, his dark eyes never leaving hers. He laid down where she'd gestured and let out a short, nervous sort of breath.

Manna paused, then climbed on top of him. She made the motion slow and careful, making sure her skin rubbed along his in a devastatingly slow manner. She drew it out on purpose.

By the time her pussy was near his cock he was almost trembling; his hands twitched helplessly at his sides, desperately wanting to grab at her hips. But Ren's eyes were on hers, and he was trying so hard. He wanted to please her. He wanted to be... what she wanted.

She let out a sigh. He had defeated her, again, but this time it had been in his tenderness. In his utter need to please her.

But this time it was... better.

Manna ran her fingertips along the handsome curve of his jaw. She paused, then smiled and tangled her fingers in his hair, keeping the long black tresses in a firm grip.

She placed her lips next to his; he strained towards her, hoping she'd engage in a passionate kiss, but she stopped just short.

"I'm going to destroy you," Manna whispered.

He let out a helpless, broken moan, his eyes clenched shut - and then she sank down onto him, thrusting her hips hard, throwing her head back in ecstasy.

Kylo finally lifted his hands and closed around both of her breasts. He clutched them desperately, like a man drowning.

Manna held off her orgasm, wanting him to come before she did. She had to win this time. It was a contest, whether he knew it or not.

She bucked her hips on him, leaned even closer, then grinned, knowing exactly what would push him over the edge.

"Come for me," she murmured against his lips, then gave them a long, slow lick with her tongue before adding: "Silly thing."

Ren's hands tightened almost painfully around her breasts as he came, moaning helplessly into her mouth, his hips bucking and writhing beneath her.

And as he came, she allowed herself to fall over the edge of orgasm. The hands on her breasts heightened her sensation; Manna rode it out, hard, relishing the feel of his firm cock between her thighs.

It ran through her like an electric shock, sending a jolt through every part of her. When it happened, she barely noticed that she had wrapped her arms around his neck, pulled him close, pressed his face against her neck.

She didn't notice until he was kissing her neck softly, slowly, trying to do what he'd done in the vision she'd shown him.

"Don't," Manna whispered, worried he was just trying to keep her dangling on the line. That he wouldn't ever truly be what she wanted him to be, but he would pretend he could.

Kylo paused, then smiled against her skin.

"Oh, silly thing," he breathed. Then, one hand pulled her waist close to his, the other slid up her neck to hold her tenderly. "I love you."

Manna laid there, speechless.

She had no idea what to say.


	23. Chapter 23

Kylo's lips were still moving along the soft skin of her throat tenderly, slowly. She was still coming down in the afterglow of her orgasm, arms tightening around the back of his neck, trying to keep him close, hoping that he'd say it again: hoping that he'd tell her again that he loved her. It was so hard to believe, and yet the words were on the tip of her tongue, ready to be returned in kind when -

"Step away from my technician, Commander Ren."

The voice was tight, angry. Manna managed to glance up from the tangle of black hair her nose had been nestled in to see the pale, red-headed general waiting at the door of her quarters. How Hux had gained access was a mystery but that didn't matter so much as the fact that he stood there with a team of stormtroopers, all with blasters at the ready.

When Kylo didn't move, Hux raised one hand to the stormtroopers. They aimed.

"Do what he says," she whispered in Kylo's ear.

He had frozen around her, unwilling to surrender.

When he didn't move Manna ran one hand along his side where the General couldn't see, soothing him, urging him towards safety.

"Do what he says. Or at least say something. Please."

"Why should I step away?" Ren barked immediately, his lithe body still perched over hers.

"Because Supreme Leader Spoke has commanded it." Hux's tone was haughty as he smirked, looking over their naked forms together in bed, but Manna noticed he moved one hand before his crotch - as though to hide something.

"Has he?" Kylo growled.

"Why don't you _look_ _,"_ Hux teased, the corners of his mouth jerking upwards into a tight smile, "and find out?"

The way he stood, the way he was looking at them, Manna knew he had something up his sleeve. The last time she'd seen him he hadn't looked a fraction this confident. It worried her.

Ren paused, then closed his dark eyes, seeming to tap into something important. After only a moment he murmured, "I'm sorry," and jerked away.

Manna didn't pretend to be surprised. She watched him leave, pulling on all the essential parts of his costume, making sure every piece was in place.

At the end, when he had his mask in hand, he jerked his head towards the door of her quarters, indicating he wanted the General to come too.

"Come," Ren said harshly. "You can escort me to Snoke yourself."

When there was a pause, a decided hesitation, the Commander added,

"Wouldn't that be how the Supreme Leader wanted it? You and I, meeting with him - together?"

Hux's upper lip twitched. Kylo had him there.

"Absolutely, _Commander."_

And then they were both gone, Ren and Hux and all the Stormtroopers, and Manna lay in wait to anticipate what came next.

* * *

She knew something was wrong when she attempted to go to her post and found that the door to her quarters wouldn't open.

Manna had waited. She waited a long time - she'd taken a shower, dressed, watched the sun set through her tiny window. At the very least she supposed she'd be allowed dinner, since in Ren's quarters her meals were delivered. Here, she was simply another stormtrooper. So with the absence of a meal being delivered, she'd assumed she'd be let out to eat dinner in the commons before returning to her position as a technician.

When she wasn't, that was when Manna came to realize she was being held captive.

She slammed her fist against the button again, and again, and again. Nothing.

She ignored the crawling creep of hunger in her belly. She ignored the idea of what she knew was coming. She undressed again, sat on the edge of her bed, and waited for him to arrive.

Soon enough - maybe four, five hours after she'd been abandoned - the door slid open again.

But it wasn't Kylo. Not this time.

This time, without stormtroopers in tow, it was Hux. He was smiling.

It looked strange on his pale face. A real smile.

"Took me long enough," he managed, breathing heavily. It didn't seem like he had been physically active - more like he was... excited. "I did it, though. Got him into his own form of... reconditioning. Funny, isn't it?"

The General licked his lips, then met Manna's blue eyes with his own.

"Funny that it took _you_ to make us both realize what we truly were."

"I have no fucking idea what that means," Manna said from the edge of the bed, watching him the way a mouse watches a hungry snake. "I just know I'm not here for you. I'm not."

Hux looked her over for a long, slow moment. He began advancing on her. On each step, he began to unbutton his stiff black uniform.

"Oh?"

A step - a button. A step - a button. His boots clicked against the hard floor of her quarters.

"Tell me to stop," the General dared.

Manna was watching him. She remembered how slow, how tender he had been. How she hadn't doubted for a moment that he meant every motion he made with his body. Not like with the Commander.

A step. A button. His shirt was almost open now.

She swallowed. She wanted Ren, sure, but she wanted a side of Ren he couldn't give. She knew that. Even when he'd told her he loved her it felt like a ghost of a feeling, something you could never fully grasp or feel. A cobweb in the wind.

With Hux, it had been different.

He looked excited, but cautious. He couldn't hear what she was thinking. Another perk. He didn't know if she would give in to him.

It was... more than tempting.

She could practically hear Ren in her head - _you stupid, silly thing -_ but this time it wasn't Ren, it was her own voice chiding her for her weakness.

Weakness. Strength. Who the hell could tell anymore?

Manna swallowed. She didn't say anything - she simply slid forward on the bed and spread her legs. Not all the way, just a little, locking her gaze with his.

"Tell me to stop and I'll stop," he said, his clipped British voice suddenly lower, more sensual.

She bit at her lip and Hux lowered his palm to his crotch, massaging the erection that had clearly been there for quite some time.

He wanted her so badly and yet he wasn't going to force it on her, he wasn't going to make it something that she hated later on. He was waiting. Just like before, he was waiting for her to make a move.

A step. A button.

His shirt was open now, exposing a smooth pale chest. All that was left was the pants.

He was at the foot of her bed, their knees nearly brushing.

"Tell me to stop," Hux said again, and then Manna shot forward, pressing her mouth against his. She tangled her fingers in his short red hair, pulling him close to her, opening her legs fully.

The General wasted no time and shoved his pants down over his pale hips, not even bothering with the belt. He gripped his cock and angled it towards her throbbing sex, wrapping one arm around her waist so he could pull her closer, making soft little grunts against her lips as she kissed him.

Manna ran her hands helplessly up under his open black shirt, across the pale skin of his back, grasping him desperately as he teased the head of his manhood against her.

She let him do it until it was too much to bear; without even checking to see if Ren was listening, Manna whispered hotly into his ear, "Please, General."

That was all it took. Hux thrust into her, deep, letting out a relieved moan as she took him in.

Every touch of her fingers seemed to make him wince; he bucked as her fingertips traveled along his back, he spasmed as they made their way up the back of his neck. Manna gripped the lapels of his open black shirt and pulled him close, pressing their bare chests together, her nipples brushing his skin.

The General groaned again at the contact, then opened his mouth and put it on hers, probing gently between her lips with his tongue as his hips moved in a steady, measured pace. It was the kind of tenderness she craved from Ren and could only get in small, insincere doses.

It was what she wanted, it just wasn't who she wanted it from.

No matter. She closed her eyes and let him kiss her, let him fuck her, tried to pretend that the man inside of her was the one she wanted instead.

Hux thrust away, slowly, letting out little gasps and moans. His voice kept bringing her back, the sound of it so different from the Commander's. Manna wanted him to be quiet. She kissed him harder, trying to silence him until suddenly he drew back to stare at her, causing her to open her eyes in reflex.

His ice blue eyes were burning; his pale skin had a delicate flush to it. His red hair was mussed.

"May I call you by your name?" he asked breathlessly.

 _Stupid, silly thing._

Manna nodded because if she opened her mouth, she knew she'd start to cry.

Hux pressed himself back on top of her and started bucking just a little bit harder, hitting a tender spot deep inside, sending flames of pleasure through her deepest core.

"Manna," he moaned in her ear, then he was coming, he was whimpering and running his fingers through her hair and then she was coming too, pulling his shirt hard towards her so their chests touched, closing her eyes and pretending he was someone else.

And then, worst of all, he stayed.


	24. Chapter 24

After they had finished, to Manna's horror the General stripped fully and climbed into bed with her. With Ren, he was usually right out the door or flopped over on his side, already sleeping soundly but Hux pulled the sheets over them, his breath heavy as he propped himself up on an elbow to watch her recover.

She tried not to squirm uncomfortably beneath his icy gaze.

"He won't be back for some time," Hux murmured, answering a question she hadn't asked.

"Where is he?" She couldn't resist; it was for the best that he was gone, things were only going to get worse with the Commander and she knew it. He'd been leading her down a dangerous road, acting as though he loved her... but that didn't mean she didn't want to know where he'd gone.

"With the Supreme Leader." He said these words with a kind of quiet reverence but he seemed like he was a thousand miles away. The General paused, then dared to lift his hand and stroke her cheek with the backs of his fingers. "Poor girl," he whispered, his tender words almost too much for her to hear. "You just..." He drifted off, then stopped, the hand stroking her cheek moving to her hair.

Hux took a lock of her blonde hair and rubbed it carefully between his thumb and forefinger.

"What on earth do you see in him?" he asked softly, but it didn't seem like he wanted a real answer.

It was a fair question. One Manna had been asking herself, in fact.

"I make bad decisions," she responded in a hushed tone. Her stomach felt heavy, like she'd swallowed a handful of stones.

The General ran his palm over her forehead, smoothing her hair back from her face. Manna wondered how this could be the same man she'd seen screaming speeches full of fire and brimstone to crowds of thousands of stormtroopers.

"You should sleep."

"When he comes back," she said quickly, before the nerve could leave her, "from reconditioning... will he be different?"

A beat. Hux regarded her with an unreadable expression.

"Were you?"

She closed her eyes and held out hope that maybe Ren would.

* * *

That night, Manna dreamed.

She dreamed that it was the Commander in bed with her instead of Hux. That he was curling his body around hers, gently kneading one of her breasts in his palm. For whatever reason, she resisted for a very long time until Ren let out a quiet little groan in her ear and pulled her closer, moving his hand down to tease her sex.

She moaned in return and opened her thighs to him. It felt good, so good, and it was Kylo she wanted to make her feel good, Kylo to touch her with his strong hands.

Then he took one of hers and placed it against the smooth skin of his chest. Ren captured her mouth and kissed her but also forced her to look up at him, coaxing her little by little to move her gaze. When they were locking eyes at last, he slowly moved her palm down his chest, over his abs, down towards the throbbing length between his legs.

For the first time, Manna felt a semblance of... truth. Some sort of authenticity in the affection he was offering her. Too bad it was all a dream.

She waited until he guided her to his hard manhood before taking it in her fingers delicately, as though he were something precious.

Kylo moaned, pressing his nose against her cheek, and bucked into her palm as she rolled him carefully in her firm grip. In return his own fingers stroked along her lips, using the slickness there to tease her clit.

Neither of them said a word. They kept their bodies close, twitching as they each urged the other slowly towards orgasm. The heat between her legs was building, Ren was breathing so heavily against her skin. She slid her free hand into his long black hair and took it in a tight grasp; at the same time she tightened her fingers around his pulsing cock and pumped vigorously.

Manna felt the warm seep of his seed over her fist, heard him moan deeply as he bucked out the rest of his climax. All the while, he never stopped teasing her, his fingers dipping in and out of her womanhood, rolling the hard nub between her legs in his fingertips until she was coming so hard that the grip of his hair was probably far too tight. She couldn't help it.

Kylo slowly continued to touch her there, urging her down even as he recovered from his own orgasm. When she was finally able to open her eyes and look at him, he was favoring her with a fond smile.

"This isn't a dream," he murmured, pressing a soft kiss to her cheek before he added, "you silly thing."

* * *

She woke suddenly, damp with sweat after spending all night wrapped in Hux's cloying limbs. Her body still thrummed with the aftermath of the orgasm she'd had in her sleep.

Manna tried to pull away from the General. He responded by sidling closer, pressing his skin on hers. He kissed her shoulder tenderly.

No. She didn't want this.

Hux ran one hand up her side, then turned her face towards his. He tried to kiss her.

 _This isn't a dream, you silly thing._

When she decidedly didn't return his affections, Hux paused. He tried again, pressing his mouth against hers harder. Manna didn't push him away; she just didn't do anything else.

He pulled away, red brows knitting together in confusion.

She didn't say anything. He couldn't read her mind, but suddenly he knew everything.

"Oh," he said at last, his British tone tight with anger. "I see."

"I'm sorry," Manna whispered. She drew the sheets up to her chest and shrank back, fearing his wrath.

Hux looked at her. He looked at her for what seemed to be a very, very long time.

At last he got up, gathering his clothes from the floor. Without saying another word he took them to the bathroom, where he dressed.

When he emerged fully clothed, he barked, "Report to your post at 0800 hours, MN-8486." Then he was gone, out the door, gone.

She felt horrible. The clipped, furious way he'd referred to her as her stormtrooper code told her everything she needed to know. But perhaps it was for the better - Manna knew that even though she drew comfort from the General, she didn't want to be with him. She couldn't. Not after remembering how it was with Kylo, no matter how broken and shattered the pieces may be. They still fit together.

She waited for almost 20 minutes, making sure he had no intention of returning like Ren had a habit of doing, then showered and prepared for her first shift in quite some time.

* * *

It wasn't easy. Sure, it was great to be back in uniform. It was great to feel like a normal stormtrooper again without all the extra bullshit involved.

What was _not_ great was how angry Hux was with her.

Manna's hands moved almost as expertly as before, but not quite, and the General latched onto it right away. He spent most of the day barking reprimands at her; any small mistake she made was met with a cold storm of mildly contained fury. The other stormtroopers barely took notice but she was definitely the target and it was definitely not a mistake.

Not to mention the fact that at a certain point the General got so close to her as he was shouting discipline that his hips accidentally brushed her arm; Manna noticed how he drew back as though burnt and seemed to get even angrier, pointing out mistakes she hadn't even made yet. He began to stutter, which made him even more furious.

She took all this in stride: yes, General. I'm sorry, General. No, General, I'm not doing this on purpose. No, General, I would not rather be in reconditioning.

The worst part was that she knew it was all coming from a place of hurt. She'd been careless (in more ways than one) and this was the effect of her poor decision-making skills. This was Hux working through her rejection, paying her in kind.

The fact that she kept thinking about the dream, well, that didn't help either.

Manna's fingers fumbled with a piece of tech and it clattered to the console; Hux had finally left her alone for a few minutes to deal with another issue at another technician's station but this sound brought him stalking right back over. He'd barely opened his mouth to issue yet another reprimand when a hesitant stormtrooper approached him from behind.

"General Hux?" he said nervously.

 _"What?!"_ The General whirled on him and the stormtrooper drew back in a wince; this sort of behavior was expected from Ren, certainly, but not Hux.

"Commander Ren would... would like a word?"

"Commander Ren is in training with the Supreme Leader," he snapped irritably, blue eyes flashing.

Instead of responding, the stormtrooper stepped aside and in walked Kylo himself, masked and imposing but holding himself high.

Manna's heart was in her throat. It felt like she was barely breathing.

The two stood off in furious, silent combat. Now the other technicians were taking notice.

"We have some matters to discuss," the Commander said in an even, metallic tone. And then, in a move that shocked no one in the room more than Manna herself, Ren slowly walked behind her chair. He took one gloved leather hand and began to run it along her long blonde hair - tenderly.

"Among which being," he said, calm as ever, "my permanent acquisition of technician MN-8486... as so demanded by Supreme Leader Snoke."


	25. Chapter 25

The whole thing happened very quickly.

Hux opened his mouth to speak, his pale skin flushed pink with anger, but the Commander took no more notice of him than anyone else in the room.

"Come, MN-8486," Ren murmured, his hand still moving tenderly along her hair. "I have much to explain to you."

"And the matters we have to discuss?" Hux demanded. He was nearly bristling. His ice-blue eyes flicked from Ren to Manna, Ren to Manna.

The Commander allowed a long silence to pass between the two of them. The room vibrated with tension; everyone was waiting to see what came next. Technicians had halted their work and were watching with rapt attention.

"Later." His tone was so dismissive, so flippant, that Manna could see an immediate effect on the General.

Meanwhile, Ren slid his hand from her hair to the back of her neck and gripped it - gentle, but firm - and lifted her from her seat.

"Come," his synthetic voice said again, and for some reason the word made the place between her legs grow helplessly warm.

Manna obeyed. She followed where he lead her, which was out of the cockpit and towards his quarters. She dared not look back at Hux. She wasn't sure what she'd feel if she did.

It all happened very quickly - and soon enough she was back in that room, standing before that enormous black bed, almost trembling with anticipation. The masked Commander stared at her for a moment before removing his helmet, setting it gently on the ashy stand where it belonged, then began to disrobe. Slowly.

That horrible, handsome face. It would be her undoing, she was sure of it.

"Why am I here?" Manna managed, running her palms along her arms, thankful for the layers of her work uniform.

The cape went first. Then the gloves. Each move was careful, calculating. All the while, his dark eyes stared at her, burning holes into her soul.

"Do you know the code of the Sith?" Ren's unstimulated voice was quiet, but confident. He already knew she was going to bend to him. He was just toying with her, and they both knew it. He stripped the robe from himself and stood before her.

Manna's eyes scanned his bare, pale chest. The place between her legs pulsed warm with desire. She sat on the bed.

"No," she whispered. "Tell me."

Ren took a single step towards her. As he recited the code, he took a step for each line he uttered.

"Peace is a lie, there is only passion." A step closer.

"Through passion, I gain strength." Another step. Now he could nearly touch her; he extended his hand to demonstrate this, his fingertips nearly brushing her knee, but not quite.

"Through strength, I gain power." Manna unconsciously opened her legs to him, hoping he'd press the tented front of his black pants to her womanhood. Ren regarded her with hungry eyes and took another step forward.

"Through power, I gain victory." He could touch her now, and he did; the Commander ran the palm of his hand from her abdomen up her chest, closing his fist around her throat in a gentle but firm grip.

"Through victory," Ren managed, his voice tight, still avoiding any contact with his hips and hers, "my chains are broken."

"What does this mean, Kylo?" Manna squirmed beneath him but met his dark gaze full-on. "Why am I here? What changed?"

"There is only passion," he echoed, and suddenly slammed his erection against her open legs. They were both still mostly-clothed but the contact was nearly electric; they each let out sounds of surprise and Manna dug her fingers into the bare skin of his arms. "Only passion for the Sith. Peace means stagnation. Snoke told me you are..."

He trailed off, then started to tug off her work pants.

"...instrumental to my training. A source of passion, as it were."

Away went her pants, then her panties.

Manna shuddered, then looked down to see Ren's solemn face positioning itself between her legs.

"Passion can be wonderful. And it can be painful."

After a long, thoughtful pause, he murmured, "You are both."

He stopped, two strong hands on her knees, keeping them apart - then grinned.

"Let me show you," Kylo whispered, then his mouth closed around her womanhood. But that wasn't all - after only a moment of teasing, he used his thumbs to pull back the lips of her sex. Using the tip of his tongue he began to assault the most sensitive part of her - the inner walls of her pussy, teased and tantalized with such care that it was almost maddening.

Manna squirmed beneath him, whining helplessly. She wanted him to fuck her. She'd never wanted it more. Manna tried to project this into his brain but it was met with a dull sort of thud - a nothing. A flat, rubber rejection.

And then - worst of all - he pulled back the hood of her clit. He let her fully grasp this, twitching and whining, before lowering the tip of his tongue to her exposed pearl. Ren lapped at it slowly, then quickly, never letting her adapt to his pattern.

It was indescribable. Ecstasy. She wasn't coming, not yet, but the tender assault on the most secret part of her womanhood left her a helpless wreck. Her hands gripped his bare biceps in desperation.

She was ready to break when finally, blessedly, Ren closed his mouth over the super-sensitive bud and began to give it slow, careful sucks.

Manna felt her back arch as she gave into the orgasm, her whole body trembling, the waves of pleasure washing through her over and over. At some point, Ren moaned into her sex, and it made her shiver in a way she'd never felt before.

When it was over, she opened her eyes to look at his horrible, handsome face. But he wasn't stopping.

As she quaked beneath him Ren kept running his tongue along her womanhood, slowly and tenderly but with a decided sort of cruelty. She tried to close her knees but his strong hands kept her legs spread, open and vulnerable.

"Please, Kylo," Manna begged, her fingers creeping into his hair. Her voice had a desperation in it she didn't recognize. He wasn't stopping.

She tugged on his long, dark tresses - gently, at first, then hard, trying to pull his face away from her.

"Please!"

After what seemed like forever, when Manna was beginning to fear he might never stop, Ren drew away from the spot between her legs and licked his lips, a devilish smile playing along them.

She was breathing heavily, enjoying the afterglow but worried about what he might do - that smile meant trouble. Yet still she was unprepared when he undid his pants to release his cock and slide himself inside her so effortlessly, like a knife through warm butter; when the Commander did so Manna let out a hearty moan. She was so wet from the oral stimulation, from the orgasm that to feel him inside her, hard and ready... it was heaven.

As she felt him filling her to the hilt, she mewled helplessly and sank her nails into the bare flesh of his arms.

Kylo began to pump into her - slow, sensual - as he leaned his nose against her cheek, pressed his lips into her skin.

"Give in to it, Manna," he murmured, his hands settling firmly on her hips. His own hips kept thrusting hard; when Manna let out a small, breathless whimper, Ren moaned and began bucking even harder, burying himself deep, deep into her core. "Give in to me."

She opened her mouth to tell him to go to hell and instead heard herself mumble his name. Her hands twisted into his thick hair, her body arched to meet his. She was on the brink of another massive orgasm and wasn't sure she could handle this one without completely falling apart.

"Yes." Ren growled against her skin; Manna barely felt him poking around in her head now. It was like he lived there, like all her thoughts belonged to him. "They _do_ belong to me, Manna. _You belong to me._ The Supreme Leader has made it so-" He paused, shuddering as a wave of pleasure rolled through his lean body. "-in his own way. But now I must do it my way."

Manna shook her head and squeezed her eyes closed. She didn't want him to break her, to own her - she was just a technician, that much was true, but she was still her own person. The idea that he meant to keep her here as his pet just as Hux had said -

He wrapped one long-fingered hand around her throat in a very real grip, forgoing use of the Force in favor of his own brute strength. Ren shook her roughly as he applied gentle but firm pressure.

"Open your eyes!" the Commander barked. "Look at me!"

The hand on her neck, unbelievably, sent another incredible ripple of pleasure through her. Manna obeyed him and expected pure fury on his beautiful face; instead, she was surprised to find him cold, composed, his breath coming hard from the way he was thrusting but not out of anger. Perhaps his training truly had changed him.

When their eyes met, her blue gaze meeting his dark one, his expression even... softened. The grip around her throat loosened, his thumb began to stroke her skin lovingly.

"See? Passion. Pain. You inflict it on me. You make me stronger."

"How can a pet make you stronger?" Manna finally managed to force words through her lips but just as she did Kylo placed that thumb on her mouth, silencing her.

"Silly thing," he murmured, "you already have." Then he closed his eyes and seemed to concentrate.

She felt a gentle buzzing vibration begin to move through her, starting at her mouth where his thumb still rested. Before she could even comprehend this it swept through Manna's body in a shockingly pleasurable wave; she hadn't come yet but it felt like a ripple of an orgasm all on its own. Another wave flowed through her, edging her towards the inevitable end.

Too much. It was too much.

"Come for me, Manna." Kylo's hips began pumping harder, hitting a sweet spot deep inside her soaked sex, and as yet another vibration buzzed through her ravaged body she obeyed him. A scream wrenched its way out of her mouth. She flung her arms around his neck and held on like a woman drowning. The orgasm tore through her, unforgiving and intense, making her toes curl and her back arch.

The vibrations continued. Even as her climax began to slowly climb down every buzz felt like she was coming again.

Too much.

Manna felt lightheaded; she pressed her body against his, not sure what else to do - not capable of doing much else - and suddenly there was a loud, husky groaning in her ear as Kylo came hard, shuddering with every pulse of his own orgasm. Later, she considered that maybe the phantom pleasure he was inflicting on her was so strong he could feel the vibrations himself, and that was what pushed him over the edge.

Her chest was heaving, she couldn't catch her breath. The lightheadedness remained... as did the vibrations.

"Stop," she begged helplessly. She wasn't sure she could take any more pleasure.

No, scratch that. She _was_ sure. She had reached that point where pleasure and passion became painful, just like Kylo had promised.

Another vibration. And another. More waves of ecstasy that felt more like punishment than anything else.

Ren ignored her as he recovered, drawing back to wipe a thin sheen of sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand.

"Stop, please, please stop, please, Kylo, please!" Manna was nearly babbling, her hands pawing blindly at his chest, writhing and trying without success to escape the sensations he was torturing her with.

Finally he regarded her, his expression unreadable. He tilted his head as though he was watching something very interesting indeed.

When a single tear escaped her eye, the Commander took pity on her at last. Using the same thumb he'd placed on her lips, he wiped the tear from her cheek and slid himself out of her. At once, the vibrations stopped, and at once, Manna began sobbing weakly.

It was a strange place to find herself. Her body still thrummed with pleasure - something she'd always craved in spades - but if she could, she would've crawled out of her own skin right there. Her head, normally so full of thoughts and questions, was blank. Ren had won.

 _Through passion, I gain strength._

Manna was so exhausted, so utterly broken, trembling and gasping for air that she barely noticed when Kylo pulled her against him. He stripped the remaining pieces of her work uniform away until she was naked in his arms; with surprising tenderness, he wiped the tears away from her face, pushed back her sweat-soaked blonde hair. She leaned into him unconsciously, hardly aware of what was happening.

The Commander pressed a kiss to her damp forehead.

"Sleep now, silly thing," he whispered, and she did.


End file.
